H3 


STEPHEN   A.    DOUGLAS. 


STEPHEN  A,  DOUGLAS 


A  MEMORIAL 


A  DESCRIPTION  OF  THE  DEDICATION  OF  THE  MONUMENT 

ERECTED  TO  HIS  MEMORY  AT  BRANDON,   VERMONT, 

ON     THE     CENTENNIAL     ANNIVERSARY     OF 

HIS   BIRTH,    AND    THE   PROCEEDINGS 

CONNECTED    THEREWITH 

TOGETHER  WITH  OTHER  MATTERS 

AND  THINGS  PERTAINING  TO 

HIS      LIFE     AND 

CHARACTER 


COMPILED  AND  EDITED  BY  EDWARD  5.  MARSH 


PRIVATELY  PRINTED  FOR   THE  COMMITTEE  OF  ARRANGEMENTS 
BRANDON,   VT.,  1914 


COPYRIGHT   1914  BY   EDWARD   S.    MARSH 


PREFACE. 

In  the  preparation  of  this  memorial,  which  was  a  labor  of  love, 
the  editor  has  received  valuable  assistance  from  institutions  and 
individuals,  and  to  them  he  takes  this  occasion  to  render  his  ac- 
knowledgements and  express  his  thanks.  To  the  following  in  par- 
ticular he  desires  to  acknowledge  his  obligations  for  favors  received: 

The  Illinois  State  Historical  Society  for  a  photograph  of  the 
letter  from  Stephen  A.  Douglas  reproduced  herein,  for  permission  to 
publish  the  letter  to  Hall  Sims,  and  for  other  courtesies. 

William  L.  Patton,  of  Springfield,  Illinois,  the  owner  of  the 
hitherto  unpublished  letters  of  Douglas  to  C.  H.  Lanphier,  for  per- 
mission to  publish  them. 

Judge  Robert  M.  Douglas,  of  Greensboro,  N.  C.,  for  a  photograph 
of  the  check  given  by  Douglas  to  Abraham  Lincoln,  reproduced  herein. 

The  Sheldon  Museum,  of  Middlebury,  Vermont,  for  the  use  of 
newspapers  in  its  collections. 

The  Rutland  Herald,  Rutland,  Vt.,  for  the  use  of  its  files. 

Congressman  Frank  E.  Greene,  of  St.  Albans,  Vt. 

President  John  M.  Thomas,  of  Middlebury  College. 

Mr.  E.  G.  Hunt,  of  New  Haven,  Vt.,  for  information  and  favors 
received. 

Miss  Shirley  Farr,  of  Chicago  and  Brandon,  Mr.  F.  H.  Farring- 
ton,  of  Brandon,  and  all  other  Brandon  citizens,  who,  by  their  con- 
tributions of  money,  counsel  or  information,  have  made  this  publica- 
tion possible. 

Brandon,  Vt.,  January  18,  1914. 


CONTENTS 

Preliminary 5 

Account  of  the  Exercises 6 

Addresses    7 

A  National  Event    25 

Other  Memorial  Exercises 26 

Letters  26 

Description  of  the  Monument 32 

Albert  G.  Farr 34 

The  Birthplace 35 

Death  of  Douglas's  Father 35 

The  Ancestral  Graves 35 

Douglas  at  Middlebury  in  1851 37 

Douglas's  Celebrated  Left-Handed  Compliment  to  Vermont 39 

Douglas's  Father  Not  a  Graduate  of  Middlebury  College 40 

Douglas  at  Brandon  in  1860 41 

Daniel  Roberts'  Reminiscences  42 

Campaigning  in  1843  44 

Address  of  Senator  Jacob  Collamer,  of  Vermont 46 

Address  of  Hon.  E.  P.  Walton,  Congressman  from  Vermont 48 

Letter  of  Robert  M.  Douglas 51 

Unpublished  Letters  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas  53 

Autobiography  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas 57 

Estimates  of  Douglas 71 

A  Few  Words  in  Conclusion , . .  75 

Appendix :    Address  of  Hon.  F.  L.  Fish ...  80 


PRELIMINARY. 

At  the  annual  banquet  of  the  Dunmore  Hose  Company,  held  at 
the  Brandon  Inn  on  the  evening  of  March  14,  1912,  Rev.  C.  W.  Turner 
of  Brandon  delivered  an  address  on  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  inspired  by 
the  fact  that  Douglas  was  born  in  Brandon  April  23,  1813.  At  a 
subsequent  meeting  a  committee  was  appointed  to  take  steps  toward 
the  appropriate  observance  of  the  approaching  centenary,  consisting 
of  Ex-Gov.  E.  J.  Ormsbee,  chairman,  A.  G.  Farr,  Rev.  C.  W.  Turner 
and  F.  H.  Farrington.  At  the  annual  town  meeting  held  March  4, 
1913,  $1000  was  appropriated  for  the  expenses  of  the  proposed  celebra- 
tion. At  a  special  town  meeting  held  April  15,  1913,  the  above  named 
committee  were  confirmed  in  office,  and  C.  M.  Winslow  was  added 
to  the  committee,  and  the  selectmen  of  the  town,  W.  B.  Avery,  F.  L. 
Smith  and  F.  E.  Kingsley,  were  made  a  part  of  the  committee 
ex  officio. 

Mr.  Albert  G.  Farr  presented  to  the  town  a  monument  in  memory 
of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  and  it  was  erected  on  Grove  Street,  nearly  in 
front  of  the  cottage  in  which  Douglas  was  born.  The  town,  through 
its  committee,  graded  and  seeded  the  adjacent  ground,  changed  the 
course  of  the  road  in  front  of  the  Baptist  Church,  and  placed  the 
monument  in  position.  The  space  in  which  the  monument  stands  is 
now  known  as  "Douglas  Green." 

After  a  deal  of  correspondence  and  consideration,  the  committee 
secured  Hon.  James  Hamilton  Lewis,  U.  S.  Senator  from  Illinois,  as 
the  principal  speaker  at  the  unveiling  of  the  monument,  a  manifestly 
appropriate  selection,  Senator  Lewis  being  of  the  same  political  faith 
as  Douglas,  and  representing  the  same  state  in  the  Senate. 

For  various  reasons,  it  was  found  impracticable  to  hold  the 
exercises  on  the  exact  anniversary  of  the  birthday,  and  they  finally 
took  place  June  27,  1913. 


ACCOUNT  OF  THE  EXERCISES. 

The  public  and  business  buildings  of  the  village,  and  the  principal 
streets,  were  beautifully  and  lavishly  decorated  with  flags,  banners 
and  bunting  by  Metzger  Bros.,  of  Rutland,  while  the  private  house- 
holders hung  out  their  flags.  The  village  never  glowed  with  such  a 
mass  of  patriotic  color  before.  The  attendance  was  estimated  at  2500 
people,  including  many  from  out  of  town.  The  speakers'  stand  was 
erected  in  front  of  the  Baptist  Church,  close  to  the  Douglas  cottage 
and  the  monument.  Music  was  furnished  by  the  Brandon  Concert 
Band,  the  band-stand  being  located  in  the  park  near  by.  Besides  the 
speakers,  Ex-Gov.  John  A.  Mead,  and  other  more  or  less  distinguished 
men,  occupied  seats  on  the  speakers'  stand.  Ex-Gov.  E.  J.  Ormsbee, 
chairman  of  the  committee,  presided  and  introduced  the  speakers. 
The  weather  was  exceedingly  hot,  but  otherwise  all  that  could  be 
desired.  It  had  been  hoped  and  expected  that  Robert  M.  Douglas 
and  Robert  T.  Lincoln,  sons  respectively  of  Douglas  and  Lincoln,  the 
great  rivals  of  1858  and  1860,  would  be  present,  but  both  were  pre- 
vented by  ill  health.  A  meeting  of  these  men,  on  such  an  occasion, 
would  have  been  of  great  historic  interest. 

PROCEEDINGS  AT  THE  UNVEILING  OF  THE  MONUMENT. 

GOVERNOR  ORMSBEE: 

Ladies  and  Gentleman,  and  that  includes,  as  a  matter  of  course, 
all  of  our  invited  guests,  we  don't  need  to  enlarge.  We  will  now 
proceed  to  the  exercises  of  the  occasion.  It  has  been  said,  and  I 
adopt  the  saying,  that  Stephen  A.  Douglas  was  the  greatest  political 
leader  that  Vermont  ever  produced.  I  take  that  as  my  text, — but 
I  am  not  going  to  follow  it  by  a  sermon ;  others  will  do  that.  We  will 
now  proceed  to  unveil  this  beautiful  monument  or  tablet  presented 
to  the  Town  of  Brandon  by  her  excellent  friend,  Albert  G.  Farr,  of 
Chicago,  not  only  is  it  beautiful  but  appropriate  and  splendid  in  charac- 
ter, design  and  finish,  as  I  expect  you  will  say  when  you  see  it. 

The  monument  will  be  unveiled  by  Honorable  Martin  Francis 
Douglas,  grandson  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  whose  memory  we  celebrate 
today,  and  that  unveiling  will  proceed  now. 

(Monument  unveiled  by  Martin  Francis  Douglas.) 
(Prolonged  applause.) 


GOVERNOR  ORMSBEE: 

Ladies  and  Gentlemen:  I  now  introduce  to  you  Honorable 
Allen  M.  Fletcher,  the  Governor  of  Vermont.  (Applause.) 

GOVERNOR  ORMSBEE: 

Your  committee  had  thought  to  engage  a  speaker  for  this  occasion, 
and  sought  to  engage  one  of  no  ordinary  or  limited  or  sectional 
character.  We  wanted  to  secure,  if  possible,  a  good  Democrat,  for 
there  are  good  Democrats,  we  have  to  admit  that  fact,  even  in  Ver- 
mont. We  wanted  to  secure  at  the  same  time  a  man  of  national 
fame,  not  confined  to  one  school  district  at  least,  but  a  man  known  far 
and  wide,  as  is  the  name  of  the  man  whose  memory  we  meet  to 
celebrate  today,  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  and  we  flatter  ourselves  that 
we  have  succeeded  in  finding  such  a  man,  not  only  a  Democrat,  but  a 
man  of  national  fame,  a  man  fit  and  suitable  for  this  occasion,  and 
this  is  the  Honorable  James  Hamilton  Lewis,  United  States  Senator 
from  the  State  of  Illinois.  Ladies  and  Gentlemen,  it  gives  me  great 
pleasure  to  introduce  to  you  Mr.  Lewis. 

ADDRESS  OF   SENATOR   LEWIS. 

Mr.  Chairman,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen: 

I  want  to  thank  your  prominent  townsman,  your  former  Governor, 
for  his  very  kind  reference  to  me,  but  before  I  begin  to  talk  to  you, 
there  are  some  things  that  must  be  straightened  out.  The  Governor 
first  would  tell  you  that  I  am  here  as  a  Democrat,  and  calls  me  a  "good 
Democrat,"  and  then  pours  out  water  for  me  to  drink.  Now  I  know 
what  the  Governor  meant  when  he  referred  to  good  Democrats  and 
poured  water  for  me.  He  meant  that  only  good  Democrats  drink 
water.  (Laughter.) 

I  appreciate  Governor  Ormsbee's  expression  that  the  person  who 
should  be  here  upon  this  occasion  ought  to  be  a  man  free  from  such 
a  thing  as  mere  partisanship.  Well,  let  me  tell  you  that  it  is  very 
difficult  in  these  days  for  any  man  living  in  the  zone  where  I  live 
to  ascertain  exactly  what  it  is  that  marks  the  line  of  distinction  between 
the  party  Democrat  and  the  party  Republican. 

Ladies  and  gentlemen,  for  myself  I  find  a  pleasure  in  this  occasion. 
I  pray  I  may  be  indulged  by  you  with  some  little  reference  to  myself 


that  you  may  understand  why  I  feel  a  degree  of  keen  pleasure  in 
being  here  and  that  you  may  understand,  though  physically  ill  and 
exceedingly  so,  I  rescued  myself  sufficiently  in  order  that  I  might 
be  here.  About  fifteen  years  ago  I  was  living  in  the  State  of  Wash- 
ington, on  the  northwest  coast  of  this  country ;  I  was  born  in  Virginia, 
reared  in  Georgia  and  schooled  in  Virginia,  and  went  to  the  North- 
west with  a  view  of  being,  if  I  could,  a  lawyer.  Subsequent  days 
followed  in  my  career,  and  I  became  the  Congressman-at-large  from 
the  State  of  Washington,  serving  at  Washington  City,  with  the  usual 
lack  of  knowledge  which  youth  possesses,  and  a  want  of  judgment 
that  inexperience  always  gives. 

One  of  the  very  best  gifts  in  my  life  was  to  know  a  distinguished 
gentleman,  of  great  wisdom,  of  great  power  intellectually,  when  on  a 
visit  to  the  University  where  I  had  been  a  scholar, — I  refer  to  the 
late  Senator  Morrill  of  Vermont.  We  became  friends.  We  after- 
wards knew  each  other  when  I  was  a  new  member  of  Congress.  His 
excellent  counsels  were  always  at  my  command.  I  never  allowed  an 
opportunity  to  pass  me,  when  I  needed  counsel  of  anyone,  that  I  did 
not  feel  free  to  seek  that  distinguished  and  experienced  source.  So 
well  known  was  my  feeling  toward  Senator  Morrill  that  when  he 
passed  away  I  was  honored  by  being  named  as  one  of  the  committee 
to  bring  his  remains  back  to  splendid  old  Vermont,  where  today  they 
are  sleeping  in  the  honored  memory  of  his  countrymen.  I  came  to 
Montpelier,  and  there  upon  the  first  visit  I  had  ever  made  to  this 
State,  was  honored  with  the  acquaintance  of  the  Legislature  then  in 
session,  and  met  many  of  your  eminent  citizens,  the  memory  of  which 
has  remained  with  me  during  these  years,  much  to  my  delight  and 
pleasure. 

When  I  moved  to  Chicago  to  take  up  my  home,  one  of  the  first 
acquaintances  that  came  to  me  as  a  friend  was  a  distinguished  citizen 
of  Vermont,  who  remained  my  guide,  counsellor  and  friend;  and 
when  your  present  distinguished  Senator,  Senator  Dillingham,  pre- 
sented the  request  of  your  honorable  committee  that  I  honor  myself 
by  coming  here  to  officiate  upon  this  occasion,  I  very  freely  told 
him  that  I  had  never  had  the  opportunity  in  the  past  to  cultivate  the 
acquaintance  of  or  know  the  people  of  Vermont,  as  I  would  delight 
to  do,  and  because  of  that  I  would  have  you  know,  ladies  and  gentle- 


men,  I  chose  to  come  here  for  the  personal  gratification  it  affords  me. 
Added  to  this  was,  of  course,  that  othert  thought :  I  am  from  Illinois, 
as  has  been  referred  to  by  your  distinguished  citizen,  and  come  to  you 
from  the  public  councils  of  the  nation.  When  an  invitation  comes  to 
any  man  from  Illinois  to  give  him  an  opportunity  to  express  some 
word  of  praise  and  admiration  for  the  great  character  who  did  so 
much  to  immortalize  that  State,  such  person  so  honored  with  such 
chance  could  not  well,  indeed,  decline  it.  I,  therefore,  owe  to  Illinois, 
that  in  her  behalf  I  should  come  where  I  might  be  permitted  to  speak 
of  her  late  distinguished  and  devoted  son ;  and  that  the  privilege  was 
afforded  me  here  in  the  State  where  he  was  born,  made  doubly  gratify- 
ing the  opportunity  and  enhanced  the  pleasure  I  enjoy  in  its  fulfilment. 
I  join,  indeed,  with  your  committee,  in  my  praise  for  the  under- 
taking which  greets  my  eye ;  beautiful  in  design,  chaste  in  its  construc- 
tion, modest  in  its  appearance,  yet  shapely  in  strength,  like  the  one 
whom  it  represents.  Gentlemen  of  Vermont,  gentlemen  of  this 
beautiful  town,  I  would  that  you  allow  me  to  say  to  you,  that  you 
deserve  well  because  you  have  paused  from  the  arduous  labors  of 
your  existence,  from  the  trying  cares  of  your  occupations  to  con- 
template some  duty  you  owe  to  yourselves.  It  may  be,  gentlemen 
of  Vermont,  nothing  but  an  experience  to  you  today,  that  afterwards 
you  might  allude  to  as  a  passing  picture  upon  the  panorama  of  your 
life's  experience,  that  at  Brandon  on  the  27th  day  of  June,  in  1913, 
you  were  present  when  there  was  an  unveiling,  in  the  presence  of  a 
distinguished  assemblage  of  men  and  women,  of  a  monument  to  the 
distinguished  son  of  Vermont.  And  there,  gentlemen,  you  may  be 
content  to  leave  your  observation.  But  I  would  have  you  go  farther. 
I  speak  to  you  who  may  be  fathers:  there  isn't  a  little  boy  in  this 
assemblage,  who,  if  forced  in  after  days  to  struggle  against  the  same 
vicissitudes  in  life,  which  were  the  history  of  this  distinguished  man 
in  his  childhood,  and  who  may  wish  to  be  remembered  when  dead, 
in  the  affections  of  his  countrymen,  as  is  this  distinguished  man,  that 
the  occasion  will  not  animate.  This  will  inspire  the  youth  to  hope 
for  the  future  for  themselves  and  do  much  to  deny  that  creed  which 
is  now  gaining  such  ground  throughout  our  whole  land,  that  only 
wealth  can  achieve  on  the  one  hand,  or  power  of  policies  attain  success 
on  the  other.  You  young  men  likewise  who  aspire  to  the  confidence 


of  your  neighbors ;  you  who  dream  of  occupying  the  positions  of  trust 
now  held  by  those  older  than  yourselves;  you,  likewise,  may  take 
the  stimulus  of  this  occasion  and  apply  its  significance,  and  feel  with 
a  sense  of  gratification  that  your  fellow  citizens  around  you  may  find 
something  in  your  life  to  approve  and  that  out  of  the  fullness  of  time 
they  may  speak  an  appreciation  of  the  things  you  do,  and  praise 
of  the  life  you  have  lived,  if  you  only  confine  it  to  such  objects  as 
are  virtuous,  as  may  command  the  love  of  your  fellows,  and  gain 
the  admiration  of  your  countrymen. 

You  women,  who  find  it  agreeable  to  grace  this  occasion:  this 
means  much  for  you;  whether  it  shall  mean  your  boy,  your  brother, 
the  man  of  your  house  who  lives  today,  or  those  who  shall  come 
after  you — many  a  mother  in  the  land  may  point  to  those  monu- 
ments which  decorate  hallowed  spots  in  this  beautiful  State,  as  a 
continuing  incentive  to  the  ambitious  youth  and  a  hope  to  the  child 
for  whom  at  night  she  offers  prayers  unto  God. 

If  there  be  no  other  mission  that  the  people  of  this  community 
have  performed  in  erecting  this  monument  before  the  eyes  of  this 
multitude,  this  alone  will  be  sufficient, — that  it  offers  encouragement 
to  living  mankind  to  remember  that  in  splendid  deeds  and  in  a  glorious 
life,  whether  the  origin  be  humble  or  poor,  exalted  or  great,  there  will 
be  left  in  the  memory  of  mankind  some  appreciation  of  a  true  nature, 
of  a  true  man,  and  some  gratitude,  at  least,  in  the  hearts  of  his  country- 
men for  his  noble  sacrifices  for  patriotism  and  for  country. 

Gentlemen  of  Vermont,  it  is,  of  course,  a  truism  to  say  that 
the  object  of  this  gathering  is  not  to  pay  tribute  to  a  mere  person. 
The  citizen  of  my  town  (Chicago),  a  native  of  your  own,  who  pre- 
sented this  monument  out  of  respect  to  one  of  your  own,  did  not 
expect  that  it  should  be  received  and  planted  before  your  eyes  merely 
as  some  unfading  memorial  of  the  present  time  to  one  of  God's  atoms, 
a  man.  It  was  reared  that  it  might  suggest  to  you  some  events  of 
the  life  of  a  man.  It  appears  in  its  glory  before  you  that  it  may  speak 
and  sound  the  greatness  of  a  life  that  was  lived  in  order  to  accomplish 
something  for  other  men. 

You  who  have  travelled  in  classic  Greece,  recall  that  outside  of 
Athens  at  what  is  known  as  the  Seventh  Pillar,  there  is  inscribed  the 
celebrated  expression  of  the  ancient  Pericles,  proclaiming  that  a  land 

10 


without  history  is  a  country  without  heroes.  Emerson,  having  occasion 
to  allude  to  this  inscription,  said  that  in  Republican  America  it  would 
be  reversed,  and  the  expression  would  be  that  a  land  without  heroes 
would  be  a  country  without  history.  Because  in  America  there  is  no 
spot  that  is  not  chastened  by  sacrifices  made  either  for  liberty  of 
men  or  for  the  glory  of  mankind.  There  is  no  community  where 
there  are  no  heroes  in  the  memory  of  the  generation  which  exists, 
those  who  brought  to  their  lives  the  glory  of  sacrifice  on  the  battle- 
field or  splendor  of  devotion  to  citizenship. 

Then,  my  fellow  citizens,  I  come  not  here  today  to  recount  the 
well-known  story  of  the  early  life  of  the  hero  of  this  occasion;  I  am 
not  to  speak  of  the  humble  beginning  in  the  humble  residence  that 
sits  there  opposite  our  doings  today;  nor  will  I  speak  of  the  details 
of  the  life  of  one  who  became  immortal  in  our  country.  I  rather 
choose  to  speak  to  you  of  the  things  for  which  he  stood.  I  rather 
avail  myself  of  this  precious  hour  to  remind  you,  my  fellow  country- 
men, of  some  of  the  things  which,  now,  in  the  calm  light  of  reflection, 
we  can  correctly  judge,  and  thus  remedy  the  mis  judgment  and  error 
of  our  people  against  a  great  American. 

It  is  to  be  regretted,  gentlemen  of  Vermont,  that,  as  a  matter 
of  experience,  while  a  man  lives,  justice  is  hardly  his  if  his  life  is 
active.  While  a  man  endures  in  the  performance  of  public  affairs 
he  is  judged  by  contemporaries  either  in  a  spirit  of  party  rancor  on 
the  one  hand,  or  an  over-zealous  enthusiasm  on  the  other. 

Joshua  Reynolds,  at  the  close  of  one  of  his  greatest  lectures, 
before  the  National  Geographical  Society  in  London,  referring  to  great 
painters,  said:  "The  Present  is  ever  at  war  with  the  Future.  The 
man  who  hopes  to  achieve  the  fame  of  the  To-Morrow  must  abandon 
the  hope  of  fame  of  the  Present,  and  he  who  would  allure  to  himself 
the  mere  prize  of  To-day,  must  remember  he  will  forfeit  the  calm  judg- 
ment in  the  great  coming  days  in  which  he  would  love  to  be  both  loved 
and  praised." 

Stephen  A.  Douglas  today  is  an  example  of  the  truth  of  this 
dictum  of  the  distinguished  artist.  Then  we  ask  ourselves,  what  were 
the  particular  things  which  this  citizen  of  America  stood  for  which 
occasioned  him  either  to  be  admired  by  some  or  condemned  by  others  ? 


11 


What  were  the  particular  theories  of  government  which  he  sought 
to  advance? 

Were  you  to  have  assembled  here  in  Vermont  50  years  ago, 
there  would  have  arisen  in  your  midst,  schooled  and  learned  as  they 
were,  men  to  speak  of  the  heroes  of  the  time  and  political  matters  of 
the  day.  From  these  you  would  have  heard  the  statement  that 
Stephen  A.  Douglas  committed  his  offence  against  government  because 
he  stood  for  the  doctrine  called  state's  rights  as  against  national 
unity.  You  would  have  been  told  that  the  doctrine  for  which  Douglas 
stood  was  in  direct  variance  with  the  best  theories  of  government ; 
that  it  was  against  the  principle  of  the  liberty  of  men ;  and  you  would 
have  known  that  there  were  at  that  time  in  this  country,  splendid 
citizenship  and  noble  patriotism  that  could  not  possibly  agree  with  the 
doctrines  of  Douglas.  But  here  in  this  hour,  when  political  rancor 
is  stilled,  and  partisan  politics  is  dead,  when  peace  has  settled  upon 
us  and  home  life  has  been  renewed  in  all  parts  of  this  great  republic 
and  the  genuine  spirit  of  citizenship  beats  in  the  heart  of  every  true 
American,  men  may  view  their  fellow  men  without  prejudice  on  the 
one  hand  or  undue  praise  on  the  other,  and  in  such  hour  the  real 
truth  may  be  spoken,  and  history  may  record  that  justice  is  to  be 
done  a  fellow  citizen. 

It  is  because  of  that  consciousness  on  my  part  that  I  make  free 
to  revive  to  the  minds  of  my  fellow  citizens  what  was  the  real  funda- 
mental political  issue  at  that  time. 

You  will  recall,  gentlemen  of  New  England,  that  from  your 
homes,  your  sons  went  to  the  great  West  with  a  view  to  settling  it 
and  establishing  there  liberty  and  domestic  institutions.  Here  in  New 
England  originated  a  theory  of  government  which  can  be  described  as 
Home  Rule.  So,  when  your  forefathers  founded  Connecticut,  Maine, 
Massachusetts,  and  Vermont,  there  originated  in  Vermont  the  germ 
of  the  doctrine  of  Home  Rule,  and  it  has  grown  to  such  an  extent  that 
she  would  not  today  abandon  for  any  consideration  her  town  govern- 
ment, her  doctrine  of  Home  Rule,  by  which  her  citizens  may,  by 
their  ballot,  make  their  own  government. 

This  man,  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  came  from  you. 

Your  ancestors  had  learned  of  the  government  in  Greece;  they 
had  read  and  knew  of  the  Israelitish  government.  The  idea  of  Home 

12 


Rule  was  so  strong  that  tribes  went  to  war  with  each  other  in  order 
to  vindicate  their  positions.  When  Greece  had  reached  her  highest 
point  of  civilization  it  was  when  Athens,  Syracuse,  Corinth  and  Sparta 
in  themselves  were  countries,  small  republics,  local  governments,  with 
the  right  to  manage  their  own  affairs  and  be  sovereign  within  their 
own  domains.  They  were  opposed  to  the  idea  of  centralization,  of 
having  from  any  one  point,  at  a  distance,  direction  or  dictation  to  the 
home  government  where  the  citizen  lived, — as  to  how  he  should  rear 
his  family,  school  his  children  or  worship  his  God. 

From  this  theory  of  government  your  early  fathers  drew  their 
inspiration  as  against  the  theory  of  centralized  power  which  Rome 
presented.  Your  fathers  chose  to  adopt  that  doctrine  of  home  rule 
and  local  self-government  presented  by  the  Greeks.  Thus  in  New 
England  they  laid  the  foundation  of  home  rule. 

Douglas,  as  a  boy,  here  upon  the  street  corners  of  Brandon, 
from  the  books  he  read,  from  the  methods  of  public  men  he  knew, 
adopted  this  doctrine  of  home  rule  and  self-government.  As  a  young 
man,  he  read  of  the  War  of  the  Revolution  and  the  fight  of  your 
fathers  against  the  domination  of  kings.  He  knew  what  the  Revolu- 
tion was  fought  for;  he  knew  the  glory  of  the  Green  Mountain  E<pys 
and  all  of  their  efforts  and  sacrifices  recounted  in  the  history  of  the 
Republic.  When  he  moved  to  the  West,  what  cardinal  doctrine  could 
have  been  so  steeped  in  his  heart  and  entrenched  in  his  mind  as  that 
which  you  taught  him  from  your  doorsteps  in  his  childhood, — that 
which  you  taught  him  as  a  young  scholar,  and  which  he  learned  at  the 
Academy  ? 

Douglas  carried  this  idea  of  home  rule  and  the  liberty  of  men 
out  to  the  West,  and  when  he  settled  in  that  great  Mississippi  valley 
and  the  strife  came  on  as  to  the  form  of  government  among  those 
people,  what  was  he  to  do?  What  had  he  been  taught  in  Vermont? 
Could  be  have  forgotten  the  theory  of  your  fathers'  government? 
Could  he  have  ignored  the  doctrines  which  you  taught  him?  Could 
he  have  known  any  other  theory  of  government  than  that  which  he 
had  seen  give  such  good  results  here  in  his  New  England  home? 
Could  any  of  you  gentlemen  of  God's  church  move  out  to  the  land 
of  Mohammed  and  easily  change  your  faith,  or  begin  teaching  some 
religion  wholly  distinct  from  that  which  you  had  learned  in  your 

13 


youth  by  the  side  of  the  holy  altar?  You  old  soldiers,  who  wear 
the  bronze  button  on  your  breast,  I  say  to  you,  could  you  depart 
into  some  new  country,  under  the  flag  of  despotism,  and  fight  for 
anything  there  as  you  fought  for  the  liberty  of  mankind? 

What  else  could  this  man  do?  How  else  could  he  live  except 
by  the  teachings  you  imparted  to  him  in  the  State  of  Vermont? 

What  was  meant,  my  fellow  citizens  of  Vermont,  by  the  oft- 
quoted  expression  of  "state's  rights"? 

Professor  Draper,  in  a  discussion,  had  occasion  to  observe  that 
by  the  mere  use  of  some  one  term  the  ideals  of  man  can  wholly  be 
destroyed,  and  all  the  theories  that  have  been  built  up  as  necessary  to 
government  completely  rendered  without  influence.  He  meant  to  say, 
that  so  inclined  are  we  at  times  to  catch  a  phrase  and  add  a  meaning 
to  it,  and  pass  it  from  one  meaning  to  another,  without  ourselves 
considering  its  real  meaning,  thus  giving  it  a  false  meaning,  that  finally 
it  arrives  to  where  it  presents  the  very  reverse  of  its  original  mean- 
ing. What,  then,  did  Douglas  mean  when  he  referred  to  the  theory 
of  state's  rights?  There  never  was  in  the  mind  of  any  thoughtful  man 
in  America  the  thought  that  state's  rights  meant  that  the  states, 
sovereign  in  matters  of  home  rule,  were  to  be  sovereign  over  the 
nation  in  national  matters.  Douglas,  taking  his  text  from  New  Eng- 
land, when  he  arrived  in  the  West  found  two  great  problems.  One 
was,  the  building  of  new  states  in  the  new  territory  opened,  and 
the  form  of  government  that  those  localities  should  assume.  The 
other  was  that  baleful,  baneful  question  of  slavery,  which  had  ac- 
cursed every  nation  that  had  come  into  being.  These  two  confronted 
him.  It  was  natural  that  the  people  of  New  England  should  have 
confused  Douglas's  idea  when  he  expressed  his  mind  regarding 
"squatter  sovereignty"  and  assume  that  he  meant  that  "state's 
rights"  meant  the  right  of  the  states  to  have  slavery,  notwithstanding 
any  declaration  on  the  part  of  the  federal  government.  Others  would 
say  that  state's  rights  meant  the  rights  of  the  states  sovereign  over 
the  federal  government  to  secede  from  the  nation,  if  at  will  and 
pleasure  they  chose  to  do  so,  despite  the  will  and  pleasure  of  the  nation. 

What  Douglas's  idea  upon  secession  was  when  he  lived  in  New 
England,  it  is  impossible  to  glean  by  any  absolute  expression  of  his 
own;  but  New  England  had  learned  that  the  right  of  secession  came 

14 


when  government  became  so  onerous  or  so  severe  that  those  who 
had  to  endure  it  could  endure  it  no  longer,  consistent  with  liberty. 
In  New  England  the  Declaration  of  Independence  pointed  out  that 
when  any  government  became  burdensome,  it  was  the  right  of  the 
people  to  alter  or  abolish  it.  Whether  Douglas  carried  to  the  far 
West  the  idea  that  the  states  had  a  right  to  secede  merely  by  the 
decision  of  themselves,  I  am  not  able  to  state.  But  we  do  know  that 
he  never  entertained  for  a  moment  the  thought  that  the  states  ever  had 
the  right  to  secede,  when  the  question  confronted  him  directly, — 
when  he  realized  that  the  nation  would  oppose  such  action  and  the 
right  granted  would  mean  the  dissolution  of  the  Union. 

Then  we  come,  my  fellow  citizens,  to  trace  for  a  moment  his 
career,  in  order  to  ascertain  what  real  place  in  history  he  deserves,  this 
man  who  has  been  so  unjustly  misrepresented,  or  honestly  misunder- 
stood. 

When  the  question  arose  as  to  whether  those  states, — Illinois, 
where  he  lived,  a  new  state;  Nebraska,  the  territory;  Kansas,  the 
territory;  California,  the  new  state,  coming  from  territory  to  state- 
hood, should  be  sovereign  in  their  local  affairs — when  he  voiced  his 
belief  that  those  different  peoples  had  a  right  to  decide  for  them- 
selves the  form  of  government  they  should  have,  it  was  claimed,  of 
course,  that  he  meant  to  give  them  the  right  to  decide  for  slavery 
within  their  borders,  and  thereafter  to  have  it  protected.  But  that 
you  may  see  how  manifestly  unfair  this  was, — we  find  that  when 
California  came  into  the  Union  and  her  Constitution  was  presented 
to  the  United  States  Senate  by  Senator  Cass  of  Michigan,  a  Democrat 
also,  some  question  arose  as  to  the  land  of  California  and  how  it 
should  be  disposed  of, — Douglas,  guided  by  the  doctrines  he  had 
learned  in  Vermont,  arose,  and  opposed  the  arguments  of  his  fellow 
Democrat  and  the  doctrine  that  was  urged,  seeking  to  prescribe  by 
Congress  in  what  manner  the  land  of  California  should  be  enjoyed 
by  her  people, — arguing  that  when  she  came  into  this  Union  she 
should  be  allowed  to  prescribe  her  own  laws,  as  a  sovereign  state,  by 
her  own  people. 

So  you  will  see,  my  fellow  citizens,  there  was  neither  the  sug- 
gestion of  slavery  as  an  institution,  nor  the  thought  of  it.  His  idea 
was  that  of  home  rule;  his  was  the  theory  that  without  home  rule 

15 


there  could  be  neither  patriotism  nor  sovereignty  of  the  government. 
He  had  learned  that  lesson  which  you  all  have  learned  in  some  form 
or  other.  You  take  from  the  town  of  Brandon  the  right  to  govern 
its  own  affairs,  and  allow  Montpelier  to  say  by  her  Legislature  sitting 
there  how  you  shall  educate  the  scholar,  how  your  men  shall  live,  what 
shall  be  their  occupation, — what  rights  would  Brandon  have  against 
that  centralized  power?  What  a  cry  would  come  forth  from  the 
citizens  of  Brandon  if  they  were  unable  to  govern  their  home  affairs ! 
Their  minds  would  revert  to  the  sacred  memory  of  the  fathers  of 
Vermont  and  the  history  of  New  England,  and  they  would  cry  "Give 
us  liberty  of  personal  action  by  our  vote,  or  end  the  farce  of  free- 
dom !" 

So  Douglas  argued,  it  being  the  doctrine  of  home  rule  he  learned 
in  New  England,  because  he  realized  that  if  you  take  from  a  people 
the  right  to  govern  themselves  in  their  private  affairs,  they  first  become 
resentful,  and  then  those  who  are  benefitted  become  the  favorites, 
the  others  the  oppressed.  It  was  because  of  this  theory  that  this 
distinguished  scholar  in  history  and  philosophy  sought  to  incul- 
cate these  principles  in  the  great  West,  that  the  glorious  republic 
might  be  preserved.  So,  when  the  constitution  of  Kansas  was  pre- 
sented for  the  consideration  of  the  people,  thinking  that  it  might 
contain  some  clause  touching  the  question  of  slavery  within  the  limits 
of  Kansas,  which  would,  of  course,  be  natural,  in  view  of  the  temper 
of  the  times,  he  then  did  as  he  had  previously  done  respecting  the  land 
of  California,  insisted  on  the  very  same  doctrine  as  to  Kansas.  It 
was  a  very  natural  thing,  also,  that  he  should  urge  that  the  constitu- 
tion of  Kansas,  as  that  of  Nebraska,  should  be  so  framed  that  the 
people  within  the  limits  of  the  states  should  create  their  own  govern- 
ment. All  this  was  the  natural  outcome  of  the  teachings  which  were 
his,  the  life  which  he  led  and  the  doctrines  which  he  taught. 

So  you  will  see,  gentlemen  of  Vermont,  that  when  there  came 
back  to  Vermont  the  theory  that  one  of  her  sons  was  the  advocate 
of  slavery,  because  he  was  an  advocate  of  the  doctrine  of  home 
rule  and  state's  rights, — you  will  see  at  once  how  manifestly  wrong 
it  was,  how  unfair  the  accusation  brought  against  him. 

Many  were  the  ideas  expressed  in  that  stormy  hour  that  we 
would  never  hear  in  these  days  of  peace.  What  is  the  situation  now? 


Let  us  pause  for  a  moment  and  test  Douglas  and  the  position  he 
occupied,  as  tried  by  time. 

We  have  no  war  now, — Heaven  be  praised!  No  contention 
among  our  fellow  countrymen  that  threatens  to  involve  us  in  war. 
We  can  now  view  the  matter  with  the  calm  judgment  of  today. 

There  is  California  now, — 50  years  after  Douglas  sought  to  es- 
tablish the  policy  of  home  rule,  for  the  home  government  of  her 
schools.  During  the  administration  of  President  Roosevelt  it  was 
prescribed  that  the  Japanese,  a  people  foreign  to  our  religion,  foreign 
to  our  mode  of  living  and  foreign  to  our  sense  of  domestic  life,  should 
not  be  permitted  to  send  their  children  to  the  same  school  houses 
used  by  the  children  of  American  parents.  No  attempt  whatever  to 
prevent  them  from  having  the  same  school  advantages,  the  same 
books,  the  same  form  of  teaching,  the  same  opportunity  of  education ; 
but  merely  the  separation  of  alien  races.  The  Japanese  nation  at 
once  set  up  a  protest  against  separate  schools  in  America  for  the 
Japanese  and  American  children. 

Then  it  was  that  you  saw  the  doctrine  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas 
commending  itself  to  President  Roosevelt,  for  it  appeared  to  him,  by 
the  doctrine  of  home  rule  she  (California)  had  a  right  to  prescribe 
the  form  of  teaching,  and  regulate  the  schools  for  her  children,  without 
dictation  from  Washington. 

California  urged  her  rights  as  a  sovereign  state,  asking  merely 
local  home  rule  in  matters  only  within  the  state  and  not  involving  the 
national  constitution.  If  you  will  pardon  a  bit  of  personal  experience, 
— I  happened  to  be  in  Tokio,  Japan,  at  the  celebration  of  the  20th 
anniversary  of  their  constitution.  I  held  an  insignificant  commission, 
which  gave  me  the  privilege  of  being  present  at  that  assembly.  It 
was  impossible  for  those  good  people  to  have  any  possible  appreciation 
of  our  dual  form  of  government.  They  could  not  understand  why 
the  President  of  the  United  States  at  Washington,  as  the  Emperor  at 
Tokio  directed  matters  in  distant  parts  of  the  empire,  could  not  from 
his  seat  direct  California  as  to  what  should  be  her  action  regarding 
her  state  matters. 

It  was  Stephen  A.  Douglas  who  had  educated  the  great  West 
to  the  theory  that  if  they  ever  allowed  the  principles  of  home  rule 
to  be  taken  away  from  them  they  would  have  a  centralized  power, 

17 


and  following  that  there  would  be  a  few  favorites  and  many  oppressed. 
The  favorites  would  mount  upwards  until  they  reached  the  very  high- 
est apex  of  power,  while  the  humble  man  would  remain  a  subject 
instead  of  a  citizen,  such  as  he  had  the  right  to  be  under  the  constitu- 
tion. 

It  was  Stephen  A.  Douglas  who  learned  these  lessons  in  grand 
old  Vermont,  and  in  turn  taught  them  to  the  great  West  in  the  doc- 
trines of  liberty  and  home  rule.  It  was  because  of  this  teacher  and 
the  lessons  he  brought  from  Vermont  that  the  West,  in  which  I  live, 
is  now  able  to  govern  its  matters  at  home,  its  purely  state  matters, 
as  their  ideas  of  justice  and  right  direct. 

Is  it  to  be  wondered  then,  that  President  Wilson,  a  Democrat, 
like  Roosevelt,  Republican,  in  recommending  this  theory  of  our  govern- 
ment, was  compelled  to  say  to  Japan,  lately,  respecting  the  question 
of  land  and  land  tenure  in  California,  just  exactly  as  President  Roose- 
velt had  been  compelled  to  say  respecting  the  form  of  schools  that 
California  should  prescribe  for  her  own  within  her  own  state? 

On  this  platfrom  I  am  honored  by  the  presence  of  distinguished 
lawyers  of  Vermont,  a  state  which  has  given  such  men  as  Edmunds 
and  Phelps  to  the  country,  the  world, — they  will  recall  that  the  highest 
court  in  the  land  (the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States)  last  week 
endorsed  the  doctrine  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  for  when  the  Republican 
state  of  Minnesota,  the  Republican  state  of  Kansas,  the  Democratic 
state  of  Alabama  and  the  Democratic  state  of  Nebraska  joined  to- 
gether to  protest  to  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  against 
the  attempt  of  the  federal  government  at  Washington,  through  the 
United  States  courts,  to  enjoin  the  states  and  prevent  the  execution 
of  their  legislative  acts  to  regulate  railroad  rates  within  the  states, 
laws  to  protect  the  depositors  in  their  home  banks,  to  prescribe  a  fair 
rate  for  light  and  heat  within  the  cities;  and  when  the  federal 
government  upon  the  theory  of  centralization,  and  dictation  from  a 
central  head,  through  the  federal  courts,  enjoined  those  sovereign 
states,  binding  the  arms  of  their  attorney-generals,  paralyzing  their 
executives,  rendering  useless  the  ballot, — these  states,  without  regard 
to  party  lines,  joined  in  one  solemn  array  before  the  Supreme  Court 
of  the  United  States  to  be  heard  to  contend  again  for  the  doctrine 
taught  by  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  of  Vermont,  of  Illinois,  of  America, — 

18 


the  old  doctrine  of  home  rule.  These  men  appealed  to  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States  for  their  remedy,  and  when  the  opinion 
came  a  week  ago,  we  there  saw  the  reflection  of  the  teachings  of 
Douglas,  and  the  Supreme  Court  adopted  Douglas's  doctrine  in  the 
construction  of  the  federal  constitution,  and  held  that  it  was  not  in 
the  power  of  a  centralized  government  to  restrain  local  home  rule 
in  a  state. 

It  is  not  false  pride  in  you  Vermonters  that  you  can  look  back 
over  the  lapse  of  years  and  reflect  that  your  fellow  citizen,  a  native 
of  this  state,  taught  the  nation  a  doctrine,  which  now  has  borne  such 
fruit  in  its  fulness,  but  which  has  been  so  misunderstood  and  mis- 
represented. 

I  wish  to  call  your  attention  to  the  next  era  in  Douglas's  history, 
which  becomes  important  to  us  today:  Douglas,  standing  alone  and 
unsupported  in  the  United  States  Senate,  observed  that  if  England 
were  allowed  to  locate  her  government  in  Central  America,  and  gain 
a  foothold  there,  with  Canada  at  the  north  and  Honduras  at  the 
south — it  would  be  but  a  little  while  when  the  United  States  would 
be  in  the  heart  of  this  great  imperial  body,  with  its  head  England,  and 
its  feet  laved  in  the  waters  of  Central  America;  that  we  would  be  in 
the  imperial  grasp,  surrounded  and  controlled  by  a  foreign  govern- 
ment. 

Thus,  when  the  treaty  was  offered  America,  known  as  the  Clayton- 
Bulwer  treaty,  because  of  Clayton  representing  our  government  and 
Bulwer  representing  the  English  government,  it  provided  conditions 
under  which  a  canal  might  be  constructed  through  the  isthmus,  but 
gave  to  England  the  right  to  locate  in  Honduras  and  take  a  part  of 
Central  America;  and  it  was  also  provided  in  the  treaty  that  any 
canal  or  water-way  that  should  be  cut  could  only  be  fortified  and  its 
shores  inhabited  by  Americans  with  the  consent  of  the  English.  There 
seemed  at  that  time  not  a  voice  in  that  senate,  composed  of  eminent 
statesmen  and  learned  men,  to  be  raised  against  this  manifest  injustice, 
the  evil  of  which  no  man  could  see  far  enough  to  measure,  until  that 
native  of  Vermont  arose,  thoroughly  versed  in  the  doctrine  which  he 
had  learned  in  Brandon;  honestly  believing  and  earnestly  teaching 
that  no  royal  government  should  exist  in  America — Douglas  believing 
this,  raised  his  voice  against  that  treaty  and  laid  down  the  doctrine 

10 


of  what  he  called  the  American  foreign  policy, — which  was,  that  in 
America  there  should  only  be  American  government ;  that  there  should 
not  be  established  in  this  country  any  off-spring  of  kingship  in  Europe. 
That  had  been  settled  by  the  Revolutionary  fathers, — that  no  imperial 
form  of  government  or  monarchy  should  be  introduced  on  this  con- 
tinent. In  that  he  saw  the  death  of  liberty.  He  saw  the  country 
fortified  by  Canada  to  the  north  and  by  Spain  to  the  south,  and  we 
as  a  country  surrounded  and  confined,  and  the  first  moment  America 
should  raise  her  voice  in  protest  against  any  wrong,  the  imperial  gov- 
ernment of  England  would  interfere  and  America  would  be  obliged  to 
submit.  In  the  name  of  the  Revolutionary  fathers  he  raised  his  voice. 
He  protested  against  it ;  he  prophesied  that  if  this  treaty  were  allowed 
to  go  through  in  this  condition,  America  would  rue  it.  That  there 
would  come  a  time  when  she  would  raise  her  voice  to  defend  herself 
but  it  would  be  too  late.  He  was  again  charged  with  wrongful  motives ; 
he  was  charged  that  his  purpose  was  to  create  again  the  old  strife, 
and  to  breed  again  the  old  discontent.  But  he  was  not  to  be  moved. 
The  strong,  rock-ribbed  New  Englander  was  there;  the  man  taught 
of  his  fathers  was  there;  the  man  who  came  from  Puritan  stock  was 
there;  the  man  who  came  from  religious  stock  that  believed  in  God 
and  justice  was  there;  the  man  who  believed  in  all  things  noble  was 
there;  the  man  who  had  chosen  to  devote  his  life  to  the  good  of  man- 
kind was  there!  And  now,  my  fellow  citizens  of  Vermont,  you  read 
in  your  papers  that  that  very  treaty  that  Stephen  A.  Douglas  raised 
his  voice  against  and  from  which  he  prophesied  that  evils  would 
arise  is  interpreted  in  the  very  way  that  Douglas  said  would  be 
claimed, — England  now  claims  that  by  virtue  of  that  treaty,  which 
Douglas  raised  his  voice  in  protest  against,  we  have  no  right  to  fortify 
the  canal,  to  defend  it  against  the  approach  of  enemies  without  the 
consent  of  England.  That  we  have  no  right  to  locate  American 
colonies  within  certain  boundaries,  without  the  consent  of  England; 
and  more,  that  Vermont  shall  not  send  her  granite  or  marble  through 
the  canal,  our  own  canal,  without  the  consent  of  England  and  England 
saying  what  tolls  shall  be  paid  by  Americans  for  the  purpose  of 
shipping  American  products. 

Where  is  the  spirit  of  Douglas  today?     It  hovers  about  us  to  see 
your  approval  of  his  position  when  he  prophesied  in  his  wisdom  the 

20 


very  crisis  that  has  come  upon  America,  which  involves  us  in  ques- 
tions of  greater  importance  than  any  since  the  days  of  slavery  and  the 
civil  war.  Had  Douglas's  view  of  American  foreign  policy  been  then 
adopted,  no  deep  and  certain  wrong  would  have  been  done  in  that 
treaty,  such  as  now  threatens  us. 

The  principle  of  conducting  our  own  affairs  in  America  (known 
as  the  Monroe  Doctrine),  had  been  promulgated  by  our  fathers  for 
the  benefit  of  Americans  in  America.  Douglas  was  for  its  spirit, 
others  merely  mouthed  its  letter.  This  recalls  to  mind  the  saying 
of  the  great  Cicero,  that  there  comes  an  hour  when  mankind  confess 
their  error  and  are  glad  to  admit  themselves  wrong  that  they  may 
admit  a  wronged  brother  was  right. 

We  turn  at  this  point  to  recall  the  memory  of  the  patriotism  of 
Douglas.  When  it  was  plain  that  a  frenzied,  maddened  sentiment  in 
the  South  was  bent  upon  fastening  the  institution  of  slavery  upon  the 
country  or  dismembering  the  republic,  when,  in  the  wild  enthusiasm 
of  these  men  who  professed  to  be  leaders  and  statesmen,  they  gained 
a  following, — men  who  blindly  rushed  after  the  leaders  to  a  point 
where  this  Union  was  threatened  with  dismemberment, — and  Stephen 
A.  Douglas  beheld  such  was  the  likelihood,  he  was  called  in  by  his 
late  great  opponent,  Mr.  Lincoln.  He,  who  had  carried  on  the  debates 
with  him  all  through  Illinois,  he  looked  to  him  for  guidance  and 
counsel  in  this  hour  of  trouble,  though  he  was  Republican,  and  Douglas 
a  Democrat.  Douglas  had  conducted  joint  debates  with  Lincoln  upon 
the  questions  of  the  day,  and  at  Jonesboro,  in  Illinois,  Lincoln  had 
said:  "I  wish  it  known  that  I  agree  with  Judge  Douglas  that  in 
domestic  matters  a  state  has  a  right  to  do  as  it  pleases  even  as  to  the 
matter  of  slavery."  Thereafter,  he  and  Douglas  well  understood  each 
other  and  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  defeated  in  his  laudable  ambition  to 
be  President,  his  ambition  crushed,  his  day  of  hope  clouded,  his  future 
dimmed  so  far  as  political  honors  might  be  concerned,  his  health 
broken,  went  to  Lincoln,  and,  seeking  only  for  the  good  of  his  country, 
tendered  his  efforts  to  aid  his  successful  rival.  Mr.  Lincoln  said 
to  him,  "the  hour  has  come  when  I  fear  something  must  be  done; 
we  must  be  ready;  I  feel  we  should  order  fifty  thousand  men  to 
shoulder  arms."  Douglas  said  (as  reported  in  the  private  corre- 
spondence of  Stanton),  "Mr.  Lincoln,  if  there  are  men  to  be  sum- 

21 


moned,  let  there  be  enough,  let  there  be  two  hundred  thousand  and 
at  once!"  Lincoln  said  to  him:  "Douglas,  do  you  understand  the 
situation  ?"  Douglas,  his  face  blanched,  replied :  "Unfortunately,  too 
well !"  He  well  understood.  He  had  done  all  he  could  to  avoid  war. 
He  came  back  to  his  countrymen,  he  pleaded  with  them;  he  knew 
what  it  meant;  he  knew  the  desolation  it  meant  for  the  people;  he 
pleaded  with  mothers  that  they  might  influence  their  husbands  and 
children;  he  beseeched  children  to  beg  of  their  fathers  and  brothers 
to  avoid  war.  He  dreamed  of  an  hour  when  the  glory  of  the  country 
could  be  maintained  in  peace ;  of  a  day  when  no  hand  should  be  raised 
against  another,  brother  against  brother,  friend  against  friend.  He 
told  Lincoln,  "I  hear  in  Illinois  there  is  serious  disturbance;  that 
there  in  our  state  there  is  some  doubt  of  loyalty  to  you.  I  do  not 
know  what  I  should  do,  whether  I  should  remain  here  in  the  Senate 
or  whether  I  should  return  to  Illinois,  where  you  need  support."  Lin- 
coln said,  "My  friend,  do  what  you  think  is  best."  And  Douglas, 
conscious  that  his  health  would  but  little  permit  him  to  take  the  long 
and  difficult  journey,  notwithstanding,  started  for  his  state  and  the 
state  of  Lincoln,  that  there  might  be  peace  preserved,  families 
brought  together,  conciliation,  if  possible,  and  the  avoidance  of  dis- 
sension against  the  President  of  the  United  States.  Douglas  was 
never  permitted  to  turn  his  face  again  to  the  capital.  He  pleaded 
with  his  people ;  he  pointed  out  to  them  the  consequences,  and  had  his 
advice  been  taken  there  would  have  been  no  war.  Had  the  voice  of 
the  people  been  heard  instead  of  that  of  the  leaders,  whose  selfishness 
dragged  their  followers  to  death  and  their  country  to  disaster,  there 
would  have  been  no  such  calamity  as  befell  our  common  country. 
Douglas  raised  his  voice  in  every  place  for  liberty,  and  with  Webster, 
for  "liberty  and  union,  one  and  inseparable,"  throughout  every  valley 
and  on  every  hill. 

He  went  to  his  bed  and  his  last  words  were  to  his  children,  a 
message  to  be  faithful  to  the  constitution  of  their  country  and  to  up- 
hold the  laws  of  the  republic.  Patriot  in  life!  Patriot  in  death! 
Faithful  and  loyal  in  every  hour !  An  American  of  Americans !  This 
was  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  of  the  United  States. 

And  the  memory  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas  will  remind  us  that 
patriotism  is  again  called  for;  the  last  message  of  that  noble  citizen 

22 


to  his  children,  to  maintain  the  laws  and  uphold  the  constitution,  can 
but  fill  our  hearts  at  this  hour  with  love  and  admiration  for  a  man 
who  lived  for  his  country,  for  a  common  flag,  for  a  common  republic, 
as  every  man  should  live  for  his  country  and  for  his  flag,  that  the 
sentiment  may  be  fully  realized, — "A  government  of  the  people,  for 
the  people  and  by  the  people  that  shall  not  perish  from  the  face  of 
the  earth." 

I  thank  you  all  and  bid  you  good  day. 

GOVERNOR  ORMSBEE: 

We  have  with  us  today  the  Governor  of  Vermont,  and  we  want 
to  have  him  let  you  see  him  and  hear  him  as  much  or  as  little  as  he 
will.  I  introduce  to  you,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen,  Governor  Fletcher. 

GOVERNOR  FLETCHER: 

Governor  Ormsbee,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen: 

When  I  was  invited  here  by  Governor  Ormsbee  it  was  with  the 
distinct  understanding  that  I  was  to  look  dignified  and  confine  myself 
to  that  entirely,  and  so  his  calling  upon  me  to  speak  makes  me  feel 
that  I  have  been  a  failure  in  that  respect.  There  is  a  time  for  all 
things,  and  after  the  magnificent  address  that  we  have  listened  to,  it 
seems  to  me  time  to  draw  the  veil.  There  are  certain  limitations, 
my  friends,  that  surround  the  Governor  of  a  state.  Only  a  few 
days  ago  I  was  asked  to  deliver  an  address  in  the  town  of  Walling- 
ford  on  Memorial  Day.  I  responded  and  after  it  was  over,  an  old 
soldier  approached  me  upon  the  platform  and  said,  "Sir,  I  would 
like  to  shake  hands  with  you;  we  have  had  six  or  seven  Governors 
here  upon  like  occasions,  and  you  are  the  first  one  that  knew  when 
to  stop."  I  feel  in  duty  bound  to  say  to  you  that  neither  Governor 
Ormsbee  nor  Governor  Mead  have  spoken  upon  that  platform  in 
thirty  years. 

Just  one  word:  It  seems  to  me  that  it  is  very  fitting  that  the 
town  of  Brandon  should  be  proud  of  this  honor;  it  is  very  fitting 
that  the  state  of  Vermont  should,  as  a  state,  take  pride  in  the  honor 
that  is  Brandon's.  My  friends,  I  think  you  will  agree  with  me  that 
Divine  Providence  long  ago  determined  to  make  the  United  States 
the  greatest  country  on  the  face  of  the  earth,  and  we  all  know  that 
Vermont  has  been  of  material  assistance  to  Divine  Providence  to  that 
end. 

23 


That  being  the  case  there  is  but  one  thing  for  you  to  do, — to 
keep  on  having  celebrations  of  this  kind ;  you  have  good  cause  for  it ; 
set  an  example  to  the  state  of  Vermont;  she  cannot  turn  her  back 
from  the  path  she  has  taken,  if  she  wants  to,  and  she  is  with  you 
in  spirit.  I  thank  you,  my  friends.  (Applause.) 

GOVERNOR  ORMSBEE: 

I  introduce  to  you  the  grandson  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  who  is 
here  with  us,  Honorable  Martin  Francis  Douglas,  who  has  come 
all  the  way  from  his  home  to  witness  this  celebration. 

MR.  DOUGLAS: 

Mr.  Chairman,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen: 

Permit  me  to  thank  you  in  the  name  of  his  family,  for  your 
tender  kindness  in  turning  for  a  moment  from  the  busy  affairs  of 
life  to  do  honor  to  the  memory  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas. 

Permit  me  to  thank,  in  the  name  of  patriotic  citizens  generally, 
the  generous  donor  of  this  magnificent  monument.  It  is  just  and 
proper  to  applaud  the  exploits  of  men  of  action;  but  the  man  who 
rears  a  monument  to  perpetuate  the  record  of  a  heroic  event  or  erects 
a  statue  to  inspire  the  coming  generations  of  men  with  the  patriotism, 
the  courage,  the  self-sacrifice  of  those  who  have  gone  before,  is 
scarcely  less  to  be  commended.  Men~may  perform  deeds,  but  only 
historians  can  preserve  them.  The  pages  of  an  ordinary  history  may 
be  burned,  or  destroyed  or  forgotten;  but  the  work  of  the  historian 
who  inscribes  in  bronze  and  marble  is  imperishable.  Down  the  ages 
to  the  farthest  stretches  of  time  his  work  will  be  a  continual  reminder 
of  the  glory  of  the  past,  and  a  constant  incentive  and  inspiration 
to  virtue  in  the  present. 

Mr.  Chairman,  Stephen  A.  Douglas  loved  Vermont  and  Brandon 
with  all  the  ardent  affection  of  a  dutiful  son.  And  if  the  dead  can 
see  from  their  far  away  abode,  and  are  aware  of  our  earthly  thoughts 
and  actions,  this  proof  of  the  citizens  of  his  native  town  that  he  did 
not  live  in  vain,  must  thrill  his  heart  with  tenderness  and  strengthen 
his  deep-seated  devotion  to  his  native  state  and  people.  For  it  was 
here  that  his  life  began.  It  was  here  that  his  early  childhood  imbibed 
those  heroic  traditions  and  exalted  principles  that  have  distinguished 
this  state  since  the  beginning  of  her  history,  and  are  the  common 
inheritance  of  all  her  sons.  It  was  here  that  his  mind  received  its 

24 


EX-GOV.   E.  J.  ORMSBEE. 


bent,  which  later  manhood  developed  and  strengthened,  but  did  not 
change.  And  so  his  descendants  love  to  think  that,  although  driven 
afar  by  the  unalterable  chance  and  circumstance  of  life,  his  character 
still  retained  the  impress  of  his  birth,  it  still  retained  the  immovable 
quality  of  the  granite  of  his  native  hills  amid  all  the  shifting  policies 
and  political  expedients  of  those  stormy  days. 

I  only  regret  that,  dying  amid  the  clouds  of  civil  war  and  fraternal 
bloodshed,  and  broken-hearted  over  the  imminent  destruction  of  the 
Union  he  loved  so  dearly,  and  for  which  he  sacrificed  so  much,  he 
could  not  have  seen  the  sunshine  and  peace  of  today;  that  he  could 
not  have  seen  his  descendants  from  the  South  join  in  grateful  and 
brotherly  affection  with  his  native  townsmen  of  the  North  in  a  common 
appreciation  of  his  services  to  the  Union  of  the  states. 

GOVERNOR  ORMSBEE: 

You  all  know  that  the  beautiful,  appropriate  and  costly  monu- 
ment we  have  today  unveiled  is  the  gift  of  Albert  G.  Farr,  of  Chicago 
and  Brandon.  I  fear  that  but  for  his  liberality  and  kindly,  noble 
spirit,  that  we  should  never  have  had  this  celebration,  and  now  I  want 
to  ask  you  to  give  three  cheers  for  Albert  G.  Farr. 

(Three  cheers  given.) 

Mr.  Farr  is  not  able  to  be  here  on  account  of  illness,  which  we 
very  greatly  regret. 

A  NATIONAL  EVENT. 

The  celebration  was  an  event  of  national  importance.  The 
Associated  Press  was  represented,  and  accounts  were  sent  by  wire  to 
their  members  all  over  the  country,  and  published  the  next  morning, 
the  Boston  papers  devoting  much  space  to  it.  The  cinematograph 
man  was  there  with  his  camera,  and  on  thousands  of  stages  through- 
out the  country  the  exercises  have  been  repeated  to  tens  of  thousands 
of  people  in  the  form  of  motion  pictures.  Some  of  the  leading 
architectural  and  monumental  trade  journals  published  engravings  of 
the  monument,  with  very  favorable  comments.  Leslie's  Illustrated 
Weekly  had  an  illustration  of  the  monument  and  cottage,  with  a  brief 
summary  of  the  proceedings,  containing  the  curiously  erroneous  state- 
ment that  Douglas  was  "a  United  States  Senator  from  Illinois  during 
the  civil  war." 

25 


OTHER  MEMORIAL  EXERCISES 

were  held  on  the  birthday  anniversary,  April  23,  at  Douglas's  tomb  and 
monument  in  Chicago,  and  at  the  state  Capitol  of  Illinois  in  Spring- 
field. The  former  were  under  the  auspices  of  the  Chicago  Historical 
Society,  and  the  speakers  and  attendants  were  largely  made  up  of 
those  who  had  known  Douglas  in  his  lifetime  or  been  present  at  his 
funeral.  Some  had  heard  some  of  the  debates  of  1858.  There  were 
also  further  exercises  in  the  rooms  of  the  Historical  Society  in  the 
evening,  at  which  Martin  F.  Douglas  read  an  address  prepared  by  his 
father,  Robert  M.  Douglas. 

At  Springfield  the  exercises  were  held  in  the  hall  of  the  House 
of  Representatives,  before  the  members  of  the  General  Assembly  and 
visitors.  Gov.  Dunne  presided,  and  the  speakers  included  Senators 
James  Hamilton  Lewis  and  Lawrence  Y.  Sherman,  of  Illinois,  Senator 
James  E.  Reed,  of  Missouri,  former  Vice-President  Adlai  E.  Steven- 
son, and  Robert  D.  Douglas,  another  grandson  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas. 

In  the  National  House  of  Representatives  at  Washington,  April 
23,  1913,  Hon.  William  E.  Williams  of  Illinois  delivered  an  address 
on  the  life  and  character  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas. 

LETTERS. 

Among  the  many  letters  received  by  the  committee  and  others 
in  connection  with  the  centenary  celebration  at  Brandon,  the  follow- 
ing are  of  special  interest  and  have  therefore  been  deemed  worthy  of 
publication. 

FROM    ROBERT    M.    DOUGLAS. 

JUNE  25TH,  1913. 

Mr.  F.  H.  Farrington, 
Brandon,  Vt. 
Dear  Mr.  Farrington: — 

You  cannot  imagine  the  pleasure  it  would  give  me  to  be  with  you 
on  "Douglas  Day,"  and  extend  in  heartfelt  words  the  thanks  I  feel 
to  those  who  have  done  so  much  to  commemorate  my  father's  memory. 
But  my  health  confines  me  to  the  coldness  of  written  words. 

There  is  something  peculiarly  tender  in  a  native  town  calling  back 
the  memory  of  her  son  who  has  so  long  been  absent,  but  whom  she  has 

28 


never  forgotten,  and  who  never  forgot  her.  He  trod  the  paths  of  fame 
in  a  distant  State,  and  while  she  rarely  approved  his  political  views, 
she  gave  him  credit  for  that  manhood,  loyalty  and  truth  belonging  to 
the  blood  he  bore,  and  the  pure  mountain  air  that  first  gave  him  his 
infant  breath.  And  now  one  hundred  years  after  she  gave  him  birth, 
and  fifty-two  years  after  the  State  of  Illinois  laid  him  in  an  honored 
tomb,  she  calls  back  the  spirit  of  her  unforgotten  son,  and  places  a 
monument  to  mark  her  claim  to  him  for  all  coming  time. 

TJhiis  beautiful  monument  is  the  gift  of  Mr.  Albert  George  Farr, 
who  like  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  was  born  in  Brandon  and  lives  in  Chi- 
cago. Is  this  the  only  resemblance?  Do  we  not  see  in  both  the  same 
inherent  qualities  of  manhood  which  command  success?  In  the  fu- 
ture years  when  Brandon  points  to  this  monument,  and  recalls  the 
name  of  the  man  whose  memory  it  commemorates,  she  may  well  re- 
call with  pride  the  name  of  the  man  who  placed  it  there.  Mr.  Farr 
may  rest  assured  of  the  lasting  appreciation  of  his  generous  gift  by 
all  who  bear  the  Douglas  blood. 

One  of  the  peculiar  pleasures  I  would  have  had  in  visiting  Bran- 
don would  have  been  meeting  Miss  Lucy  W.  Smith,  whom  I  have  long 
known,  not  personally,  but  through  her  uniform  courtesies. 

Some  years  ago  she  sent  me  a  beautiful  set  of  photographs  show- 
ing how  she  had  added  to,  and  preserved  as  far  as  possible  the  out- 
lines of  the  old  Douglas  days.  This  did  much  to  keep  alive  the  in- 
terest in  my  father's  memory  and  local  association. 

Her  generous  invitation  to  have  been  her  guest  would  have  been 
gratefully  accepted  could  I  have  come. 

Now  my  dear  Mr.  Farrington,  I  have  much  to  thank  you  for. 
Your  lofty  conception  of  the  meaning  of  this  event,  and  your  earnest 
and  intelligent  effort  to  give  it  shape  and  direction.  Your  persistent 
work  has  met  the  fullest  success. 

As  I  and  my  descendants  are  the  only  living  descendants  of 
Stephen  A.  Douglas,  I  felt  that  our  family  should  be  represented. 
Therefore,  my  youngest  son  and  law  partner,  Martin  F.  Douglas,  will 
represent  us. 

With  best  wishes  and  kindest  regards,  I  remain, 

Sincerely  yours, 

ROBERT  M.  DOUGLAS. 

27 


FROM  EX-PRESIDENT  TAFT. 

NEW  HAVEN,  CONN.,  MAY  17,  1913. 

I  have  your  kind  note  of  May  15th  with  reference  to  the  proposed 
memorial  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas.  I  greatly  regret  that  my  engage- 
ments are  such  as  to  make  it  absolutely  impossible  for  me  to  be  pres- 
ent and  take  part  in  the  memorial  exercises,  the  appropriateness  of 
which  is  manifest. 

Thanking  you  for  the  compliment  of  the  invitation,  believe  me, 

Sincerely  yours, 

WM.  H.  TAFT. 


FROM  EX-VICE-PRESIDENT  STEVENSON. 

(Mr.  Stevenson's  original  letter  having  been  mislaid,  this  is  his 
response  to  a  request  for  a  copy  of  it). 

BLOOMINGTON,  ILL.,  OCT.  29,  1913. 

Your  letter  of  Oct.  27  at  hand.  I  regret  that  I  have  no  copy  of 
the  letter  I  wrote  Gov.  Ormsbee  some  months  ago.  I  send  by  this  mail 
copy  of  address  I  delivered  in  1908  before  the  State  Historical  So- 
ciety touching  the  life  and  public  services  of  Senator  Douglas.  If 
there  is  anything  in  it  of  interest  to  you  it  can  be  used  as  you  think 
best. 

In  my  early  manhood  I  knew  Senator  Douglas  well.  I  heard  him 
in  the  great  Lincoln  debates,  and  upon  many  other  occasions.  My 
first  political  speech  was  in  advocacy  of  his  election  to  the  presidency. 
I  was  present  at  the  laying  of  the  corner  stone  of  the  "Douglas  Monu- 
ment" in  Chicago. 

I  recall  him  distinctly.  He  was  one  of  the  manliest  of  men,  and  a 
statesman  worthy  of  mention  with  the  greatest  in  our  history. 

Yours  very  truly, 

ADLAI  E.  STEVENSON. 


FROM  SPEAKER  CLARK. 
THE  SPEAKER'S  ROOM,  HOUSE  OF  REPRESENTATIVES. 

WASHINGTON,  D.  C,  NOVEMBER  15,  1913. 

I  have  always  regarded  Stephen  A.  Douglas  as  one  of  the  greatest 
men  of  his  generation,  in  fact,  one  of  the  greatest  of  all  our  states- 
men. 


I  believe  he  was  one  of  the  most  skillful  debaters  this  country 
ever  had  in  it.  It  was  a  great  misfortune  for  the  country,  and 
especially  for  the  Democratic  party,  that  he  died  so  young. 

The  people  of  Vermont  do  well  to  build  a  monument  to  his 
memory. 

Yours  truly, 

CHAMP  CLARK. 


FROM  EX-SPEAKER  CANNON. 

DANVILLE,  ILLS.,  MAY  30,  1913. 

I  have  your  letter  24th  inst.,  covering  invitation  for  Douglas  me- 
morial address  in  June  or  July.  I  very  much  regret  that  my  engage- 
ments are  such  that  I  cannot  accept. 

I  am  fairly  well  acquainted  with  the  career  of  Stephen  A.  Doug- 
las. He  was  a  great  man — a  great  statesman,  and  in  several  speeches 
he  made  shortly  before  his  decease  he  did  invaluable  service  in  the 
great  contest  for  the  preservation  of  the  Union.  I  am  satisfied  that 
southern  and  central  Illinois,  southern  and  central  Indiana  and  south- 
ern Ohio  except  for  these  speeches  would  have  been  practically 
in  the  same  condition  during  the  war  as  were  Missouri  and  Kentucky. 

Very  truly  yours, 

J.  G.  CANNON. 


FROM   ROBERT  T.  LINCOLN. 

AUGUSTA,  GA.,  MARCH  6TH,  1913. 

Your  letter  reached  me  here.  The  plan  to  celebrate  the  cen- 
tennial anniversary  of  the  birth  of  Senator  Douglas  in  Brandon  and 
to  mark  his  birth  place  there  is  one  which  should  appeal  to  all  who 
recall  his  most  distinguished  career,  and  above  all  the  very  great  serv- 
ices that  he  as  a  popular  leader  rendered  in  his  last  days  to  the  saving 
of  our  government. 

I  feel  highly  honored  by  your  invitation  to  make  an  address  upon 
the  occasion,  and  much  regret  that  it  is  not  possible  for  me  to  do  so. 
The  condition  of  my  health  compelled  me  two  years  ago  to  retire  from 


active  life  and  to  refrain  also  from  accepting  invitations  like  yours  or 
even  attending  an  assemblage  such  as  you  propose. 

With  much  regret  and  with  every  wish  for  the  success  of  your 
plans,  I  am, 

Very  sincerely  yours, 

ROBERT  T.  LINCOLN. 


FROM    HENRY   WATTERSON. 

FORT  MYERS,  FLORIDA,  JANUARY  31sT,  1913. 

Your  letter  of  the  24th  of  January  reaches  me  here.  I  am  highly 
honored  by  the  invitation  it  embodies.  I  doubt  whether  any  living 
man,  except  his  surviving  son,  Judge  Robert  Douglas  of  North  Caro- 
lina, knew  Stephen  A.  Douglas  as  well  as  I  did — certainly  no  one  who 
sympathized  more  wholly  with  his  personality  and  opinions.  Hence, 
I  should  rejoice  beyond  measure  if  it  were  possible  for  me  to  deliver 
the  address.  Unfortunately,  it  is  wholly  impossible  and  most  re- 
luctantly I  am  obliged  to  decline  what  would  be  altogether  a  labor 
of  love. 

It  has  always  been  a  pleasure  for  me  to  visit  the  Green  Mountain 
section.  I  had  one  of  my  sons  at  Dartmouth  College,  and  the  region 
about  Hanover  is  most  familiar  to  me  and  my  family. 

Let  me  thank  you  for  the  very  kind  terms  of  your  letter  and  sub- 
scribe myself, 

Sincerely, 

HENRY  WATTERSON. 


FROM  EX-GOV.  SULZER. 
STATE  OF  NEW  YORK,  EXECUTIVE  CHAMBER. 

ALBANY,  JUNE  25,  1913. 

It  certainly  was  very  good  of  you  to  invite  me  to  the  Douglas 
Centennial  Anniversary  to  be  held  in  Brandon,  Vermont,  on  the  27th 
inst. 

Nothing  would  gratify  me  more  than  to  be  able  to  accept  and  be 
with  you  on  this  interesting  occasion.  However,  it  will  be  absolutely 

30 


impossible  on  account  of  pressing  official  duties  which  detain  me  in  Al- 
bany. 

It  is  fitting  that  the  anniversary  of  the  hundredth  birthday  of 
Stephen  A.  Douglas  be  celebrated  in  his  birthplace,  and  the  occasion 
made  a  memorable  one  by  the  dedication  of  a  suitable  monument. 

My  father  knew  Douglas  quite  well,  and  admired  him  much.  He 
was  a  great  American  and  a  true  patriot. 

With  best  wishes,  and  hoping  the  celebration  will  be  a  great  suc- 
cess in  every  way,  believe  me, 

Very  sincerely  yours, 

WM.  SULZER. 


FROM  SENATOR  PAGE. 

WASHINGTON,  D.  C,  JUNE  23,  1913. 
To  The  Committee  of  Arrangements, 

Centennial  Anniversary  Exercises  in  Memory  of 
Hon.  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  Brandon,  Vermont. 
Gentlemen : — 

Have  received  your  invitation  to  be  present  at  the  ceremony  in 
connection  with  the  dedication  of  the  monument  erected  to  the  memory 
of  Hon.  Stephen  A.  Douglas  on  the  27th  instant,  and  regret  exceed- 
ingly that  I  cannot  be  with  you  at  that  time  and  participate  in  what 
I  am  sure  will  be  a  most  enjoyable  occasion. 

During  the  earlier  years  of  my  political  life,  when,  as  a  boy,  I 
seized  upon  and  read  with  avidity  everything  pertaining  to  the  political 
contest  which  resulted  in  the  election  of  James  Buchanan  in  '56  and 
the  defeat  of  Douglas  and  the  election  of  Lincoln  in  '60,  I  was  a  great 
admirer  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  and  remember  to  have  spent  a  day 
in  driving  to  Montpelier  to  hear  the  "Little  Giant"  make  a  political 
speech. 

I  had  never  heard  anything  comparable  to  the  force  and  eloquence 
of  Douglas  at  that  time,  and  I  am  not  certain  that  I  might  not  add 
that  never  in  my  life  have  I  heard  anything  that  I  could  rank  as  su- 
perior to  Douglas'  memorable  speech  at  Montpelier  in  the  summer  of 
1860.  I  think  it  was  during  that  speech  that  he  uttered  the  memorable 
and  never-to-be-forgotten  sentiment:  "Vermont  is  a  good  state  in 

si 


which  to  be  born  and  a  good  state  from  which  to  emigrate."  I  think 
the  sentiment  was  not  pleasantly  received  by  the  Vermonters  who 
gathered  at  their  capital  to  listen  to  the  words  of  wisdom  which  fell 
from  the  lips  of  the  "Little  Giant,"  but  despite  this  fact  Ver- 
mont's great  pride  in  this  her  distinguished  son  did  not  abate,  and 
Vermont  has  always  been  exceedingly  proud  of  the  fact  that  she  gave 
to  the  country  one  of  the  strongest  men  in  public  life  during  the  ten 
years  which  preceded  the  Civil  War. 

Sometimes  it  seems  to  me  that  the  mental  giants  of  that  decade 
— notably  Webster,  Clay  and  Douglas — have  never  been  matched — 
certainly  not  surpassed — in  any  decade  of  our  Nation's  history,  and 
Brandon  has  every  right  to  bedeck  herself  in  her  gayest  colors  on  Fri- 
day next  while  she  honors  the  memory  of  one  of  the  most  brilliant 
statesmen  which  this  country  has  ever  produced. 

Again  regretting  my  inability  to  be  with  you  on  this  occasion,  I 
am, 

Respectfully  yours, 

CARROLL  S.  PAGE. 


(The  following  telegram  from  Senator  Dillingham  was  received 
while  the  exercises  were  in  progress.) 

WASHINGTON,  D.  C,  JUNE  27,  1913. 

I  am  just  now  in  receipt  of  a  note  from  the  President  expressing  his 
regrets  that  it  was  not  possible  for  him  to  get  away  in  time  to  attend 
the  Douglas  anniversary  at  Brandon,  planned  for  todayr  and  saying 
it  would  have  been  most  agreeable  for  him  to  have  been  there  had 
it  been  possible. 

W.  P.  DILLINGHAM,  U.  S.  S. 

DESCRIPTION  OF  MONUMENT. 

(BY  THE  ARCHITECTS.) 

On  the  cloister  wall  leading  from  the  tower  to  the  Auditorium 
at  the  University  of  Chicago  is  a  bronze  tablet  bearing  a  bas  relief 
portrait  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas.  This  tablet  was  a  gift  to  the 
University  by  one  of  its  classes.  On  this  tablet  is  the  following 
inscription : 

32 


"In  honor  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas  who  in  1855 
generously  contributed  to  the  founding  of  the  first 
University  established  in  Chicago.  This  tablet  is 
erected  in  June,  1901,  by  the  Decennial  Class  of  the 
University  of  Chicago." 

The  sculptor  for  this  tablet  was  the  well  known  American  artist, 
Mr.  Lorado  Taft. 

It  was  believed  suitable  by  the  admirers  of  Mr.  Douglas  to  use 
this  tablet  to  mark  the  birthplace  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas  in  Brandon, 
Vt.,  after  the  permission  of  the  authorities  of  the  University  of 
Chicago  and  of  Mr.  Taft  had  been  obtained. 

Mr.  Albert  G.  Farr,  a  native  of  Brandon  and  member  of  the 
Douglas  Monument  Committee,  directed  Messrs.  Sherley,  Rutan  & 
Coolidge,  well  known  architects  of  Boston  and  Chicago,  to  prepare 
a  design  for  a  monument  with  this  portrait  of  Mr.  Douglas  and  the 
following  inscription: 

"Stephen  A.  Douglas,  teacher,  lawyer,  orator, 
statesman,  United  States  Senator  from  Illinois  1847 
to  1861,  Democratic  candidate  for  President  of  the 
United  States  against  Abraham  Lincoln.  Loyal 
supporter  of  Lincoln  and  the  Union  in  the  early 
days  of  the  War  of  the  Rebellion.  Born  at  Brandon, 
April  23,  1813,  in  the  cottage  west  of  this  site.  Died 
in  Chicago,  June  3,  1861." 

On  the  reverse  side  of  the  monument,  it  seemed  well  to  place  a 
second  inscription,  as  the  monument  will  be  seen  from  both  sides : 

"This  monument  set  up  by  citizens  of  Brandon, 
Vt.,  April  23,  1913,  in  commemoration  of  the  100th 
anniversary  of  the  birth  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas 
who  was  born  just  west  of  this  monument. 

33 


"The  bas  relief  on  the  other  side  is  a  replica 
of  the  one  at  the  University  of  Chicago  by  Lorado 
Taft.  Under  the  original  is  an  inscription  referring 
to  the  generous  contribution  by  Mr.  Douglas  toward 
the  foundation  in  1855  of  the  first  University  estab- 
lished in  Chicago,  which  is  now  the  University  of 
Chicago." 


The  design  for  the  monument  is  based  on  pure  Grecian  forms 
and  is  carried  out  in  white  Vermont  marble  quarried  near  Brandon. 

The  location  chosen  for  the  monument  was  the  green  in  front 
of  the  cottage  in  which  Mr.  Douglas  was  born,  the  side  bearing  the 
portrait  facing  the  road  which,  by  the  way,  is  the  main  highway, 
which  runs  from  Boston  to  Montreal. 

The  reverse  side  of  the  monument  is  towards  the  cottage  and 
the  inscription  can  be  read  by  all  passers-by  on  that  side. 


ALBERT  G.  FARE, 

the  donor  of  the  monument,  like  Douglas,  was  born  in  Brandon, 
removed  to  Illinois,  and  there  achieved  marked  success  as  a  result 
solely  of  his  own  ability,  determination  and  perseverance.  Like 
Douglas,  too,  he  began  his  career  as  a  school  teacher,  then  practiced 
law,  made  his  residence  in  Chicago,  and  (here  the  parallel  ending) 
finally  became  a  prominent  banker.  He  is  chairman  of  the  executive 
committee  of  the  Harris  Trust  &  Savings  Bank  of  Chicago,  a  director 
of  N.  W.  Harris  &  Co.  of  Boston,  and  of  Harris,  Forbes  &  Co.  of 
New  York.  Mr.  Farr's  public  spirit  and  generous  help  to  worthy 
enterprises  and  institutions  in  his  native  town  (the  Brandon  Free 
Public  Library  may  be  particularly  mentioned)  is  well  known  and 
highly  appreciated  by  the  townspeople. 


34 


ALBERT  G.  FARR. 


Since  the  above  was  written,  Mr.  Farr,  who  had  not  been  well 
for  some  time,  succumbed  to  pneumonia  and  died  at  Chicago, 
December  23,  1913,  at  the  age  of  63,  thus  completing  the  parallel 
with  the  life  and  death  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas.  Mr.  Farr's  abilities 
as  a  financier  were  of  a  high  order,  and  won  him  wealth  and  a  reputa- 
tion in  the  financial  world,  but  to  Vermonters  he  is  best  known  and 
remembered  for  his  quiet  benevolence  in  many  directions,  and  for  his 
liberal  aid  to  many  public  enterprises  in  his  native  town  and  state. 
He  had  a  fine  summer  home  in  Brandon,  and  his  beautiful  garden 
and  grounds,  as  well  as  his  property  on  Mt.  Pleasant,  near  the  village, 
were  always  open  to  the  public.  All  who  enjoyed  his  friendship  or 
acquaintance  mourn  his  loss. 


THE  BIRTHPLACE. 

The  cottage  in  which  Douglas  was  born  was  acquired  some 
years  ago  by  Miss  Lucy  W.  Smith,  a  lady  of  taste  and  culture,  who, 
except  for  the  addition  of  a  porch  on  one  side,  has  maintained  the 
exterior  in  its  original  condition.  The  interior  has  been  transformed 
into  a  charming  modern  home,  containing  many  rare  pieces  of  antique 

• 

furniture,  and  pictures  and  other  mementos  of  the  great  man  who 
there  first  saw  the  light.  It  is  fortunate  that  the  historic  structure 
has  fallen  into  such  appreciative  hands. 

DEATH  OF  DOUGLAS'S  FATHER. 

Dr.  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  Sr.,  was  a  practicing  physician,  and 
died  suddenly  when  the  infant  Stephen  was  but  a  little  more  than 
two  months  old.  The  circumstances  of  his  death  are  narrated  as 
follows  by  Horatio  L.  Wait,  of  Chicago,  who  served  in  the  Navy 
during  the  civil  war,  and  whose  wife  was  a  granddaughter  of  John 
Conant  of  Brandon,  and  appear  to  be  authentic.  We  quote  from  a 
letter  dated  June  14,  1911 : 

35 


Soon  after  Stephen  A.  Douglas  was  born,  early  in  the  morning, 
his  father  was  sitting  in  the  living  room  before  an  open  fire  holding 
the  infant  in  his  arms.  John  Conant,  the  neighbor  and  friend,  came 
in,  and  just  as  he  opened  the  door  into  the  room  the  father  died  sud- 
denly of  apoplexy,  and  the  infant  rolled  into  the  fire.  John  Conant 
literally  rescued  the  child  from  the  fire.  Naturally  thereafter  he 
took  special  interest  in  him.  When  he  started  in  the  cabinet  making 
business,  Conant  gave  him  orders  for  tables,  bureaus  and  book  cases 
for  all  his  daughters. 

I  heard  Lincoln  and  Douglas  speak  in  Chicago,  and  was  intro- 
duced to  Douglas  and  his  then  wife  Adele,  was  greatly  impressed  by 
the  graciousness  of  both,  and  I  have  no  doubt  that  her  beauty  and 
tact  contributed  materially  to  his  public  success. 

It  is  therefore  not  surprising  that  I  felt  much  interested  when 
I  found  myself  posted  as  a  sentry  at  the  head  of  his  coffin  when  lying 
in  state,  and  stood  at  attention,  present  arms,  when  his  remains  were 
lowered  in  mother  earth,  remembering  that  a  family  ancestor  had 
plucked  as  a  brand  from  the  burning  the  infant  destined  to  become 
such  a  power  for  good  during  his  eventful  life. 


THE  ANCESTRAL  GRAVES. 

In  the  old  burying  ground  on  Center  Street,  Brandon  village,  rest 
the  remains  of  Douglas's  father,  and  paternal  grandfather  and  grand- 
mother. The  graves  are  marked  by  quaint,  old-fashioned  tomb- 
stones, adorned  with  sculptured  urns  and  weeping  willows.  The  in- 
scriptions are  as  follows : 


Doct. 

Stephen  A.  Douglass 
died  July  1st 

1813 

In  the  32d  year 
of  his  age. 


Guardian  Angels  hover  round, 
And  watch  this  virtuous  sleeping  clay, 
Till  the  last  trump  of  joyful  sound 
Proclaim  the  triumph  of  the  Day. 


Sacred  to  the 
memory  of 

Benajah  Douglass  Esq 
who  died  October  2 

1829 

in  the  69  year  of 
his  age. 

The  righteous  hath  hope  in  his  death. 


Mrs. 

Martha, 

Consort  of 

Benajah 

Douglass  Esq. 

died  April  1st 

1818,  in  the  56  year 

of  her  age. 

Virtue  lives  beyond  the  grave. 


It  will  be  noted  that  in  the  above  inscriptions,  the  surname  is 
spelled  "Douglass,"  not  "Douglas,"  as  Stephen  A.  spelled  it. 


DOUGLAS  AT  MIDDLEBURY  IN  1851. 

It  is  not  generally  known  that  Douglas  received  the  honorary 
degree  of  LL.  D.  from  Middlebury  College  at  the  Commencement  of 
1851,  and  we  have  not  seen  the  fact  recorded  in  any  of  his  biographies. 
He  was  present  and  spoke  at  the  college,  and  also  in  response  to  a 
serenade  at  his  hotel.  He  also  visited  Brandon  before  returning  to 
Illinois.  The  most  detailed  account  of  the  doings  at  Middlebury  that 
we  have  found  appeared  in  the  Brandon  Post  for  Sept.  4,  1851,  which 

37 


we  reprint  below.  The  degree  was  conferred  on  Commencement  day, 
which  was  August  20,  1851. 

The  speech  of  Mr.  Douglas  related  to  the  character  and  prospects 
of  the  College,  the  character  of  the  State  and  its  inhabitants,  and  the 
responsibilities  which  rested  upon  the  people  of  this  country  as  the 
nursery  of  educated  men  for  the  West.  His  remarks  throughout 
were  forcible,  chaste  and  eloquent,  and  were  received  by  the  audience 
with  great  tokens  of  approbation  and  pleasure.  Very  few  men  of 
Senator  Douglas's  age  and  opportunities  for  early  culture  could  have 
risen  before  that  audience,  without  preparation,  and  made  a  speech 
so  replete  with  excellent  thoughts,  so  elegant  in  language,  so  polished 
in  delivery,  and  so  full  of  all  the  graces  of  oratory,  as  the  one  he  did. 
He  closed  in  a  manner  that  showed  the  largeness  of  his  heart  and  the 
sincerity  of  the  sentiments  he  had  uttered.  He  said — "But  it  is  time, 
Mr.  President,  to  stop  talking  and  begin  to  act, — to  show  the  sin- 
cerity of  our  words  in  our  deeds.  Bring  out  the  subscription."  And 
thereupon  the  subscription  Book  was  produced  and  the  Honorable 
gentleman,  in  presence  of  the  audience,  put  down  his  name  for  five 
hundred  dollars,  and  paid  the  first  installment  of  one  hundred  dollars 

to  the  President The  young  Senator  from  Illinois  won 

"golden  opinions"  for  himself  from  men  of  all  classes  and  parties, 
and  his  presence  at  Commencement  added  much  to  the  interest  of  the 
occasion,  and  was  a  source  of  gratification  to  all  who  attended,  as  it 
was  doubtless  to  himself. 

From  another  article  in  the  same  paper  we  quote  as  follows : 

Mr.  Douglas  and  lady  arrived  at  Middlebury  on  the  18th  ult, 
and  remained  through  Commencement.  Both  himself  and  lady,  an 
accomplished  and  agreeable  woman,  were  cordially  welcomed  by  the 
inhabitants  of  that  town.  On  the  evening  after  his  arrival  quite  a 
large  number  of  the  citizens  gave  him  a  hearty  welcome  at  the  Ver- 
mont Hotel,  accompanied  by  a  serenade  from  the  Lowell  Brass  Band, 
which  discoursed  most  excellent  music  to  the  listeners,  and  being 
called  out,  he  promptly  responded  to  the  call,  and  made  a  most  beauti- 
ful speech,  (bating  a  slight  spice  of  Hunkerism  which  the  Whigs 
cheered  vociferously,  and  which,  we  doubt  not,  he  regretted  having 
indulged  in)  referring  in  a  most  felicitous  manner  to  his  former 
residence  and  occupation  in  Middlebury,  to  his  affection  for  his  native 
State,  to  his  pride  in  her  characters,  to  the  beauty  and  grandeur  of 
her  scenery,  the  richness  and  variety  of  her  products,  the  irrepressible 
enterprise  of  her  people  as  evinced  in  her  rail-ways,  and  the  great 
influence  which  through  her  sons  she  had  exerted,  and  would  here- 
after exert,  upon  the  institutions  and  destinies  of  the  new  States  and 
Territories  of  the  republic.  His  remarks,  with  the  above  exception, 
were  all  in  good  taste,  well  conceived  and  delivered  in  an  easy  and 
graceful  style  of  elocution.  He  went  from  Middlebury  to  Brandon, 
where  he  stopped  to  visit  friends  and  old  acquaintances,  and  where 

88 


he  met  with  an  equally  warm  and  cordial  reception.  Mr.  Douglas 
is  now  thirty-eight  years  of  age,  of  small  stature,  with  a  large  and 
intellectual  head,  a  frank,  manly  and  pleasing  countenance,  and  most 
courteous,  unaffected  and  agreeable  manners.  He  is  a  man  of  whom 
Vermont  may  very  well  feel  proud. 

We  extract  the  following  from  the  account  of  the  Middlebury 
Register  of  August  27,  1851 : 

To  Judge  Douglas's  naturally  fine  appearance,  winning  manners, 
and  graceful  and  dignified  oratory,  was  added  the  special  eclat  of  a 
prospective  Presidential  nomination,  highly  probable  next  year,  and, 
if  not  so  soon,  almost  certain  to  fall  upon  him  at  some  future  time. 

DOUGLAS'S  CELEBRATED  LEFT-HANDED  COMPLIMENT 

TO  VERMONT. 

In  his  remarks  at  Middlebury  College,  on  the  occasion  above 
referred  to,  Senator  Douglas  made  the  oft-quoted  statement  about  the 
advantages  of  Vermont  as  a  natal  state.  His  own  account  of  what 
he  said,  in  a  speech  in  Illinois  seven  years  afterward,  is  as  follows: 

I  was  born  away  down  in  Yankee  land;  I  was  born  in  a  valley 
in  Vermont,  with  the  high  mountains  around  me.  I  love  the  old 
green  mountains  and  valleys  of  Vermont,  where  I  was  born,  and 
where  I  played  in  my  childhood.  I  went  up  to  visit  them  seven  or 
eight  years  ago,  for  the  first  time  in  twenty-odd  years.  When  I  got 
there,  they  treated  me  very  kindly.  They  invited  me  to  the  Com- 
mencement of  their  College,  placed  me  on  the  seats  with  their  dis- 
tinguished guests,  and  conferred  upon  me  the  degree  of  LL.  D.  in 
Latin,  the  same  as  they  did  on  Old  Hickory  at  Cambridge  many  years 
ago,  and  I  give  you  my  word  and  honor  I  understood  just  as  much 
of  the  Latin  as  he  did.  When  they  got  through  conferring  the  honor- 
ary degree,  they  called  upon  me  for  a  speech;  and  I  got  up  with  my 
heart  full  and  swelling  with  gratitude  for  their  kindness,  and  I  said 
to  them:  "My  friends,  Vermont  is  the  most  glorious  spot  on  the 
face  of  this  globe  for  a  man  to  be  born  in,  provided  he  emigrates 
when  he  is  very  young." 

It  has  always  seemed  to  the  writer  as  passing  strange  that  Douglas 
should  have  expressed  himself  in  just  that  language  before  such  an 
audience  and  on  such  an  occasion,  in  the  state  to  which  he  was  re- 
ferring. It  seemed  too  much  like  a  lack  of  that  tact,  that  gracious- 
ness,  that  felicity  of  thought  and  language  which  usually  distinguished 
him.  Perhaps,  after  the  lapse  of  seven  years,  his  memory  was  not 
quite  clear  as  to  the  exact  language  used,  and  possibly  he  wanted  to 
put  it  in  a  way  to  please  his  then  audience.  We  are  fortunate  in 


being  able  to  present  to  our  readers  the  version  of  a  member  of  the 
audience  who  listened  to  Douglas's  Commencement  speech  in  1851, 
and  who  clearly  recalls  the  remark  in  question.  We  refer  to  Mr. 
E.  G.  Hunt,  of  New  Haven,  Vt.,  a  graduate  of  Middlebury  College 
in  the  class  of  1857.  Mr.  Hunt  writes  us  under  date  of  November  11, 
1913,  as  follows : 

I  was  present  and  remember  well  Douglas's  remark  about  Ver- 
mont being  a  good  state  to  emigrate  from,  &c.  Sometime  last  spring 
I  saw  in  the  Burlington  Free  Press  an  interpretation  of  that  remark, 
I  think  from  the  pen  of  Gov.  Barstow,  that  was  new  to  me.  It  was 
an  attempt  to  explain  it  in  a  manner  somewhat  far-fetched,  as  a 
compliment  to  the  state.  That  is,  that  he  meant  to  say  that  it  was  an 
honor  to  hail  from  the  state  of  Vermont.  Where  that  explanation 
originated,  whether  from  Mr.  Douglas  himself  or  from  some  other 
source,  I  have  no  idea.  It  had  never  occurred  to  me  that  it  could 
have  been  in  the  speaker's  mind  at  the  time  he  uttered  the  words, 
and  I  am  sure  it  was  not  so  understood  by  the  audience.  There 
would  have  been  nothing  in  such  a  remark  to  create  a  sensation, 
and  there  was  a  decided  sensation. 

You,  in  your  letter,  make  Mr.  Douglas  say  that  "Vermont  is  a 
good  state  to  be  born  in,  provided  you  emigrate  early."  That  last 
clause,  "provided  you  emigrate  early,"  I  do  not  think  was  in  the 
speech.  I  should  say  that  his  language  was:  "Vermont  is  a  good 
state  to  be  born  in,  a  good  state  to  be  brought  up  in,"  and  then,  after 
a  little  pause,  "and  a  good  state  to  emigrate  from."  That  "brought 
down"  the  house. 

We  think  that  Mr.  Hunt's  version  of  this  celebrated  remark  is  a 
much  more  reasonable  and  satisfactory  one  than  that  of  Senator 
Douglas  himself,  and  it  is  probably  about  what  he  said. 

DOUGLAS'S   FATHER   NOT   A    GRADUATE    OF 
MIDDLEBURY   COLLEGE. 

Several  of  the  biographies  of  Douglas  state  that  his  father  was  a 
graduate  of  Middlebury  College,  and  Douglas  himself  makes  the  same 
statement  in  his  autobiography.  This  appears  to  be  an  error.  Presi- 
dent John  M.  Thomas,  of  the  College,  writes  us: 

Several  biographical  sketches  of  Judge  Douglas  state  that  his 
father  was  a  graduate  of  Middlebury  College.  We  would  be  very 
proud  of  that  fact  if  it  were  a  fact,  but  are  unable  to  find  in  our 
records  of  graduates  or  former  students  the  name  of  the  father  of 
Stephen  A.  Douglas. 

4O 


HON.  STEPHEN  A.  DOUGLAS 

TO  HIS  NiTIVE  TOWN!! 


Saturday,  28th  inst.,  arriving  at  4  o'clock  P.  M. 

'«  rf  *""""•  "'* 


AHD 

MILITARY  ESCORT 


-,  where  raltablr 

I ,.     *i»*»    nriiiiu  t*"    »»•»"—--  9 


Per  order 

Jlllf  »™,  80-  » 


POSTER  OF  1860. 


DOUGLAS  AT  BRANDON  IN  1860. 

In  the  summer  of  1860,  soon  after  his  nomination  for  the  presi- 
dency, Douglas  made  a  campaign  tour  of  New  England,  and  visited 
Vermont,  speaking  at  several  of  the  larger  places,  and  arrived  at 
Brandon  on  Saturday,  July  28,  where  he  remained  over  Sunday. 
The  following  account  of  his  visit  to  Brandon  is  from  the  Rutland 
Herald  of  August  2,  1860. 

Some  forty  of  our  citizens,  including  the  committee  of  reception 
from  Brandon,  accompanied  Mr.  Douglas  to  Brandon,  where  he  was 
received  as  in  Rutland,  by  the  citizens  of  all  parties,  amounting  in 
number  to  some  2000  persons,  and  greeting  extended  to  him,  such  as 
Brandon  knows  how  to  bestow.  The  Brandon  House  and  many 
private  residences  were  decorated  with  flags  and  streamers,  and 
everything  wore  a  holiday  appearance.  The  "Allen  Grays"  were  out 
and  did  escort  duty,  and  the  Brandon  and  Vergennes  bands  furnished 
music  for  the  occasion. 

Upon  the  arrival  of  the  cars  at  Brandon,  a  procession  was  formed, 
escorted  by  the  Bands  and  Military,  and  headed  by  the  carriages  con- 
taining Mr.  Douglas,  the  committee  of  reception  and  the  invited 
guests,  and  followed  by  a  large  number  of  carriages  containing  the 
citizens  generally.  The  procession  moved  through  most  of  the  prin- 
cipal streets  until  it  came  to  the  old  homestead,  or  "birthplace"  of 
their  guest,  when  it  halted,  and  an  opportunity  was  given  for  those 
who  chose  to  view  at  this  time  that  interesting  relic.  A  large  con- 
course of  people  had  gathered  here  in  advance  of  the  procession,  and 
upon  its  arrival  great  enthusiasm  was  manifested  by  the  crowd.  Mr. 
Douglas,  as  well  as  his  friends,  viewed  this  relic  of  his  boyhood 
days  with  an  evident  degree  of  interest.  The  building  stands  at  the 
north  end  of  the  village,  and  is  a  small,  brown,  story  and  a  half 
house,  with  a  latticed  porch,  and  bears  evidence  of  the  humble  life 
of  the  former  occupants,  but  there  were  associations  connected  with 
it,  which  at  this  time  made  it  a  matter  of  interest  far  beyond  many 
of  more  attractive  appearance. 

After  this  halt  of  the  procession  it  then  moved  back  to  the  Bran- 
don House,  where  accommodations  had  been  provided  for  their  guests, 
and  the  procession  was  broken  up.  A  platform  had  been  erected 
in  front  of  the  hotel,  which  was  now  occupied  by  the  committee  and 
their  guests  and  a  few  invited  friends. 

Mr.  Douglas  was  welcomed  to  Brandon  and  her  hospitalities  by 
E.  N.  Briggs,  Esq.,  and  then  introduced  to  her  citizens.  Mr.  Douglas 
responded  in  a  most  touching  and  affecting  reply,  and  we  have  to 
regret  that  we  cannot  give  it  entire  to  our  readers.  He  acknowledged 
his  gratitude  for  the  attention  paid  him  by  the  citizens  of  all  parties, 
and  confined  his  remarks  to  topics  peculiar  to,  and  suggestive  of,  the 

41 


occasion.*  He  spoke  for  about  thirty  minutes,  and  was  listened  to 
with  profound  attention,  after  which  the  formality  of  the  reception 
was  broken  up,  and  he  mingled  freely  with  the  citizens.  At  eight 
o'clock  in  the  evening  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Douglas  held  a  levee  in  the  parlors 
of  the  Brandon  House,  for  the  purpose  of  receiving  their  friends, 
and  a  large  number  of  citizens  paid  their  respects  to  them. 

Mr.   Douglas  left  Brandon  on  the   Monday  morning  train   for 
Burlington  and  Montpelier. 


We  cannot  suffer  this  opportunity  to  pass  without  expressing 
our  approval  of  the  course  pursued  by  a  large  number  of  the 
Republicans  of  Rutland  County,  and  especially  of  Brandon  and  Rut- 
land, who  participated  in  this  reception.  Being  the  dominant  party 
of  this  State  with  well  known  principles,  and  a  majority,  which  under 
no  circumstances  can  be  blotted  out,  we  can  well  afford  to  be  generous 
to  our  opponents,  and  especially  so  at  this  time,  when  one  of  their 
great  chiefs,  who  was  born  among  us  in  obscurity,  but  by  his  own 
exertions  has  raised  himself  to  the  eminent  position  he  now  occupies, 
returns  with  political  objects  professedly  thrown  aside,  to  pay  a  social 
visit  to  his  own  native  County.  We  feel  that  in  so  doing  we  can 
honor  the  man  without  being  understood  as  endorsing  his  principles, 
and  we  believe  that  this  course  of  policy  is  the  best  to  be  pursued 
at  all  times  and  by  all  parties,  having  a  tendency  as  it  does  of  softening 
political  asperities  and  making  us  more  honorable  politicians  and 
better  men. 

DANIEL  ROBERTS'  REMINISCENCIES. 

In  Harper's  Magazine  for  November,  1893,  appeared  some  inter- 
esting reminiscencies  of  Douglas  by  Daniel  Roberts,  of  Burlington, 
Vt.  We  reprint  below  the  major  part  of  them: 

It  happened  to  me  when  a  young  man  of  22  to  24  years  of  age, 
to  reside  in  Morgan  County,  Illinois — for  the  most  part  at  Jackson- 
ville, the  county  seat.  This  embraced  the  period  from  about  April, 
1833,  to  August,  1835.  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  a  boy  originally  from 
Brandon,  Vt.,  had  arrived  in  the  county,  and  spent  the  winter  of 
1833-4  in  teaching  school  at  Winchester,  then  in  Morgan  County, 
some  16  miles  from  Jacksonville.  Early  in  1834  he  came  to  Jackson- 
ville, and  was  admitted  to  the  county  bar,  though  scarce  21  years 
of  age,  and  fastened  his  professional  sign  on  the  outer  wall  of  the 
old  brick  court  house,  in  which  he  took  an  office,  situate,  as  was  then 

*Mr.  J.  B.  Kelly,  who  is  still  living  in  Brandon,  played  in  the  Brandon 
Band  on  this  occasion,  and  heard  this  speech.  He  says  that  the  speaker 
referred  to  politics,  among  other  things  likening  the  Republican  party  to 
a  squirrel  on  the  limb  of  a  tree,  which  has  just  been  shot  by  a  hunter,  and 
is  clinging  to  the  limb  for  dear  life  during  its  few  last  moments,  soon  to  fall 
and  be  seen  no  more.  That  squirrel  has  not  only  clung  to  the  limb  ever 
since,  but  has  been  running  about  in  quite  a  lively  fashion  most  of  the 
time,  though  at  the  last  presidential  election  it  almost  lost  its  grip. 

42 


the  fashion,  in  the  center  of  the  public  square,  in  association  with  the 
market  house. 

Clients  were  rare  visitors  at  his  office,  nor  was  he  a  close  keeper 
of  his  office  for  either  business  or  study ;  but  he  was  out  among  "the 
boys,"  assuming  the  part  of  politician  from  the  start,  a  germinating 
and  budding  senator  and  president.  The  population  of  central  and 
southern  Illinois  was  largely  an  emigration  from  the  States  south 
of  it — Kentucky,  Tennessee,  etc. — and  of  that  class  that  made  up  the 
Jackson  democracy  of  that  day.  Morgan  County  was  Democratic, 
while  the  lawyers  of  Jacksonville  were  Henry  Clay  Whigs.  Young 
Douglas  took  in  the  situation  at  a  glance,  and  with  a  ready  instinct 
doffed  his  eastern  dress  and  manners,  and  assumed  a  suit  of  Ken- 
tucky jeans  and  an  arm-in-arm  intimacy,  in  street  and  saloon,  with 
men  of  that  uniform  and  of  the  Jackson  stripe.  Social  and  friendly 
in  manner,  ready  of  speech  and  in  debate,  with  perfect  confidence  in 
himself,  he  soon  became  a  favorite  with  the  Jackson  men,  and  was 
put  forward  as  their  champion  in  political  meetings  and  conventions. 
I  remember  it  was  in  1834  that  Benjamin  Mills,  of  Galena,  a  graceful 
speaker,  appeared  in  the  court  house  at  Jacksonville,  and  made  a  taking 
public  address  in  advocacy  of  his  own  election  to  Congress  as  a 
Henry  Clay  Whig.  William  L.  May,  of  Carrollton,  was  the  Jackson 
candidate.  At  the  close  of  this  address,  "Little  Douglas,"  as  he  was 
called,  was  thrust,  not  unwillingly,  to  the  platform,  for  he  was  on 
hand  for  a  purpose.  His  attempted  reply  and  counter-attack  were 
so  spirited  as  greatly  to  arouse  the  enthusiasm  of  his  party  friends, 
and  to  inspire  a  stout  Kentuckian  standing  near  me  to  cry  out,  "Hit 
him  again,  little  fellow !  Give  him  a  pair  of  gaffs."  It  was  a  match 
of  gamecocks  with  my  Kentucky  friend,  and  his  heart  went  out  for 
the  little  chap,  the  Bantam  cock  of  the  fight. 

It  is  said  of  Douglas  in  his  biography,  as  given  in  Appleton's 
Encyclopedia,  that  "he  was  remarkably  successful  at  the  bar,  as  may 
be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  within  a  year  of  his  admission,  while 
not  yet  22  years  of  age,  he  was  elected  by  the  Legislature  attorney- 
general  of  the  State."  This  cannot  be  a  true  inference,  for  at  that 
time,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  Douglas  had  almost  no  practice  at  the  bar 
and  no  reputation  as  a  lawyer,  his  election  as  attorney-general  to  the 
contrary  notwithstanding.  That  this  mere  boy  should  by  any  legal 
attainments  or  professional  skill  have  been  able  to  depose  Colonel 
Hardin,  a  mature  man  and  skilled  lawyer  and  eloquent  speaker,  in- 
trenched as  he  was  under  the  statute  law  of  his  appointment,  and 
have  put  himself  in  Colonel  Hardin's  place  of  his  own  force,  seems 
quite  incredible.  The  result  points  more  naturally  to  some  influences 
and  motives  outside  any  professional  or  other  special  deservings  of 
Douglas  as  the  originating  and  efficient  cause  of  this  result. 

To  the  people  of  Morgan  County  of  that  day  this  cause  and  the 
mode  of  its  working  were  well  understood  and  notorious.  They  were 
of  this  sort:  John  Wyatt,  a  farmer,  then  residing  in  the  southern 
part  of  the  county,  was  State  senator;  his  friendship  Douglas  had 


been  careful  to  cultivate.  Wyatt  was  a  fierce  Jackson  Democrat  and 
a  man  of  much  rough  force  of  character.  He  was  fiercely  and  openly 
hostile,  both  politically  and  personally,  to  Colonel  Hardin,  and  had 
determined  upon  his  removal  from  the  office  of  attorney-general;  but 
in  order  to  effect  this  the  law  must  be  so  changed  as  to  legislate  Hardin 
out  of  office  and  make  the  office  elective  by  the  Legislature.  At  the 
session  of  the  Legislature  then  held  at  Vandalia,  in  the  winter  of 
1834-5,  a  strongly  Democratic  body,  Senator  Wyatt  succeeded  in 
securing  the  required  change  in  the  law,  and  thereupon  sent  for  his 
young  friend  Douglas  to  come  at  once  to  Vandalia  and  present  himself 
as  candidate  for  the  office,  announcing:  "If  I  can  only  beat  John 
Hardin  and  beat  him  with  little  Douglas,  it  will  be  too  good."  On 
this  invitation  the  young  man  started  for  Vandalia. 

I  myself  with  a  companion  went  there  later  by  horseback  ride, 
stopping  over  night  on  the  way  at  a  wayside  inn,  where  we  enjoyed 
the  display,  new  to  us,  of  a  prairie  fire,  and  the  exhilarating  fun  of 
leaping  our  horses  back  and  forth  through  the  light  flames.  Arrived 
at  Vandalia  I  there  met  young  Douglas,  who  had  in  so  short  a  time 
made  himself  acquainted  and  familiar  with  the  members  of  the  Legis- 
lature, and  had  become  quite  a  pet  with  them,  sitting  on  their  knees 
even,  and  in  every  way  making  himself  agreeable  by  assimilation. 

Well,  the  result  of  the  legislative  canvass  was  that  Douglas  was 
elected  attorney-general,  Hardin's  seat  having  been  legislated  from 
under  him.  John  Wyatt,  Senator,  had  got  his  revenge,  and  was 
glorious  and  boastful.  He  had  beaten  John  Hardin  and  with  "little 
Douglas." 

I  remember  as  though  it  were  but  yesterday  when  Douglas,  on 
a  bright  Sunday  morning,  mounted  on  a  three-year-old  mare  colt 
furnished  him  by  his  friend,  Wyatt,  set  out  from  the  court  house 
square  for  Springfield  to  assume  his  duties  in  court  as  attorney- 
general.  He  was  not  a  striking  figure  on  horseback.  His  weight  was 
about  130  pounds  avoirdupois,  and  his  short  legs  allowed  his  feet 
to  reach  scarcely  below  the  saddle  skirts.  He  had  stored  in  his 
saddle-bags  a  book  on  criminal  law  which  I  had  lent  him;  it  was 
his  whole  library.  And  this  was  the  first  stage  of  the  political  journey 
toward  Washington  and  the  White  House  of  Douglas,  the  "Little 
Giant."  In  August,  1835,  I  came  back  to  Vermont  on  a  visit,  which 
has  lasted  to  this  hour. 

CAMPAIGNING  IN  ISJfi. 

i 

Hon.  Orville  H.  Browning,  of  Illinois,  who  succeeded  Douglas 
as  Senator  from  that  state,  was  pitted  against  him  as  a  candidate  for 
Representative  to  Congress  in  1843.  In  his  remarks  in  the  Senate 
on  the  death  of  Douglas,  he  spoke  as  follows  of  that  campaign : 

In  the  spring  of  1843,  the  State  having  been  redistricted  for 
congressional  representation,  he  and  I,  residents  of  the  same  village 

44 


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— the  one  a  judge,  the  other  a  practitioner  before  him — were  nominated 
by  our  respective  parties  as  opposing  candidates  for  Congress  in  the 
same  district. 

In  the  forenoon  of  a  bright  summer  day  in  June,  the  court  was 
brought  to  a  close  for  the  term  in  the  last  county  in  the  circuit,  and 
he  at  once  resigned  the  judgeship.* 

In  the  afternoon  of  the  same  day,  by  previous  mutual  arrange- 
ment, and  at  the  urgent  solicitation  of  both  political  parties,  we  ad- 
dressed a  large  assemblage  of  Whigs  and  Democrats,  thus  opening 
one  of  the  most  excited,  arduous,  and  earnest  political  campaigns  that 
was  ever  made  in  the  State. 

The  next  day  we  passed  into  another  county,  and  again  addressed 
the  people;  and  from  that  time  forward  till  the  election,  we  travelled 
together,  often  in  the  same  conveyance,  and  spoke  together  from  the 
same  stand  on  an  average  of  two  hours  each  per  day,  and  that  re- 
peated every  day,  as  my  memory  now  serves  me,  with  the  excep- 
tion only  of  the  Sabbath.  The  district  was  one  of  the  largest  in  the 
United  States,  both  in  population  and  territory,  and  the  summer 
unusually  warm;  and  it  is  perhaps  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  the 
health  of  both  of  us  gave  way  under  the  constant  and  heavy  draught 
thus  made  on  our  physical  and  intellectual  energies;  mine  a  little 
before,  and  his  on  the  day  of  the  election. 

Perhaps  at  no  time  in  our  country's  history  did  party  spirit  run 
higher  or  wax  warmer  than  at  this  time  it  did  in  Illinois.  Personal 
rancor  was  almost  universal,  and  personal  conflicts  not  unfrequent 
between  opposing  candidates.  Impressed  with  a  sense  of  how  per- 
nicious the  influence  of  such  an  example  was  upon  the  public  mind; 
how  adverse  to  a  calm  and  impartial  hearing  and  fair  estimate  of  dis- 
cussion of  the  questions  which  separated  us,  and  vitally  interested 
the  country;  and  how  incompatible  with  the  dignity  which  ought  to 
characterize  the  deportment  of  gentlemen  aspiring  to  high  positions 
of  trust  and  honor,  we  came  to  a  mutual  understanding,  before  entering 
upon  the  canvass,  not  to  violate  with  each  other  the  courtesies  and 
proprieties  of  life ;  and  not  to  permit  any  ardor  or  excitement  of  debate 
to  betray  us  into  any  coarse  and  unmanly  personalities.  And  I  am 
proud  to  say  that  the  compact  was  well  and  faithfully  kept  on  both 
sides.  During  the  entire  campaign  not  one  unkind  word  or  dis- 
courteous act  passed  between  us ;  and  we  closed  the  canvass  with  the 
friendly  relations  which  had  previously  subsisted  undisturbed,  and 
maintained  them,  without  interruption,  to  the  day  of  his  death. 

*While  presiding  on  the  bench  at  Knoxville,  the  news  of  his  first 
nomination  for  Congress  came.  The  news  so  stirred  the  people  that  he  was 
obliged  to  adjourn  court,  and  the  whole  assemblage,  judge  and  jury,  lawyers 
and  spectators,  paraded  around  the  public  square,  singing: 

"The  old  black  bull  came  down  the  meadow." 

—Stephen  A.  Douglas,  by  Clark  E.  Carr. 

45 


ADDRESS  OF  MR.  COLLAMER,  OF  VERMONT,  IN  THE  U.  S. 
SENATE,  JULY  9,  1861. 

Mr.  President:  Stephen  A.  Douglas  was  a  native  of  Vermont, 
and  she  claims  to  utter  a  word  on  the  occasion  of  this  solemn  an- 
nouncement of  his  deceas,.  However  much  a  majority  of  her  people 
may  have  often,  and  perhaps  generally,  disagreed  with  his  political 
positions  and  measures,  yet  they  duly  appreciate  the  strong  points 
of  his  character,  the  elevated  position  he  has  occupied,  and  the 
extensive  influence  he  has  wielded  in  this  nation,  and  cherish  pride  in 
him  as  one  of  their  sons.  That  a  poor  orphan  boy  from  the  Green 
Mountains  could  peaceably  accomplish  all  this,  is  to  that  people  not 
merely  a  matter  of  wonder  or  admiration  of  his  personal  resolution 
and  ability,  but  an  inspiring  and  brilliant  manifestation  of  the  generous 
liberality  of  our  free  institutions,  opening  the  avenues  of  enterprise  to 
success  and  elevation  to  the  effort  and  energy  of  all,  however  humble. 

Brilliant  and  commanding  as  have  been  the  positions  and  parts 
which  he  has  performed  on  the  political  theatre  of  this  nation,  it  is 
strikingly  observable  in  how  short  a  time  it  was  accomplished.  His 
whole  course  in  the  national  councils  was  confined  to  a  period  of  less 
than  twenty  years.  In  that  short  period,  laboring  in  the  Democratic 
party,  he  succeeded  in  securing  to  himself  the  sympathy  and  affection 
of  the  great  body  of  the  masses  of  that  long-dominant  party,  and 
held  their  hearts  in  his  hand.  How  generous  and  cordial  must  have 
been  the  spirit  of  the  man  to  secure  to  himself  so  extensive,  so  con- 
fiding, and  devoted  attachments ! 

The  first  great  ingredient  in  the  composition  of  his  success  was, 
that  he  was  not  merely  with  the  masses  of  the  people,  but  was  of 
them.  The  people  submit  with  cheerfulness  to  leadership  and  con- 
trol if  it  is  of  their  own  creation ;  and  Mr.  Douglas  was  not  great  by 
adventitious  circumstances  beyond  their  control.  This,  his  normal 
character,  was  never  essentially  modified  by  any  sophistications  of 
education,  which  with  him  was  very  limited;  and  he  fully  appreciated 
through  life,  as  an  element  of  his  strength,  and  often  proudly  alluded 
to,  his  early  mechanic  service  as  fixing  his  identity  with  the  masses 
of  the  people. 

Another  element  of  his  success  is  found  in  his  indomitable  energy 
and  perseverance.  This  is  too  universally  understood  to  require  re- 

46 


mark.     It  was  said  of  old  that  the  gods  help  those  who  help  them- 
selves, and  men  generally  concur  in  like  conduct. 

It  has  been  truly  said  that  "much  study  makes  a  wise  man,  much 
writing  a  correct  man,  and  much  speaking  a  ready  man."  The  last 
of  these  propositions  is  most  true  of  controversial  speaking;  and  of 
that  Mr.  Douglas  was  both  an  example  and  an  illustration.  Much  has 
been  said  of  his  power  of  debate  as  a  point  in  his  superiority  and  an 
instrument  of  his  elevation.  As  a  public  speaker,  he  was  almost  ex- 
clusively practiced  as  an  advocate  and  champion  of  the  Democratic 
party,  whose  principles  and  doctrines  he  never  questioned.  He  thus 
became  disciplined  in  occupying  and  defending  positions  rather  than 
in  selecting  them.  In  this  he  became  dexterous  and  adroit  to  an  un- 
usual and  almost  wonderful  degree  in  all  the  skill  of  forensic  gladiator- 
ship.  As  the  positions  of  his  party  were,  with  him,  unquestionable  and 
axiomatic  truths,  he  regarded  everything  opposed  to  them  as  false  and 
unfounded.  With  this  habit  of  mind,  it  became  to  him  almost  im- 
possible ever  to  receive  or  appreciate,  believe  or  present,  the  statements 
or  arguments  of  his  opponent  in  any  other  light  but  the  one  which 
would  destroy  their  force  or  enable  himself  to  answer  them.  His  per- 
sistence was  unrelenting,  very  seldom  convinced  of  error,  and  never 
betraying  a  consciousness  of  being  vanquished. 

In  contributing  to  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  compromise — that 
prolific  source  of  vast  political  complications  and  consequences — it 
was  sanctified  to  him  by  his  cherished  principle  that  the  people  were 
to  be  left  "perfectly  free  to  form  and  regulate  their  domestic  institu- 
tions in  their  own  way";  and  though  too  slow  to  believe  the  border- 
ruffian  violence  by  which  the  people  of  Kansas  were  subjugated,  yet, 
when  violence  and  fraud  culminated  in  that  great  national  swindle, 
the  Lecompton  constitution,  he  met  and  exposed  it  with  the  frankness 
and  decision  of  a  just  and  high-minded  patriot. 

Mr.  Douglas  supported  the  Democratic  party  as  a  national  party. 
His  attachments  and  sympathies  were  with  the  nation  and  its  institu- 
tions which  cherished  him;  and  his  ambition  or  aspiration  was  to  be 
President  of  the  United  States,  not  of  only  a  part  of  it.  His  defeat 
was  not  by  the  body  of  his  party,  but  by  the  conspiracy  of  men  long 
leaders  in  that  party,  no  less  ambitious  than  himself,  but  enemies 
of  the  nation,  its  institutions  and  its  flag. 

47 


He  became  what  he  was,  mainly  through  his  own  exertions;  and 
the  fact  that  they  enabled  him  to  acquire  the  distinction  he  possessed 
was  due  to  the  liberal  institutions  of  this  government ;  as  to  all  which 
he  was  neither  insensible  nor  ungrateful.  When  the  southern  traitors 
proceeded  to  the  dismemberment  of  this  government  by  open  war,  he, 
laying  aside  the  party  differences  which  separated  him  from  the 
Executive,  promptly,  and  with  frank,  patriotic  devotion,  tendered  to 
the  Executive  his  services  and  influence  to  sustain  the  government  in 
the  hour  of  its  peril.  I  say  "its  peril,"  as  it  has  long  since  outgrown 
all  apprehension  of  foreign  invasion;  and  domestic  convulsions  and 
internal  war  is  its  last  trial.  Into  this  service  he  entered  with  his 
usual  devotion,  activity,  and  eloquence,  until  arrested  by  fatal  disease. 

He  has  departed  to  his  long  home  in  the  meridian  of  his  man- 
hood, and  at  a  juncture  in  which  he  might  have  been  of  more  than  or- 
dinary service  to  the  country.  Human  judgment  might  say  his  death 
was  untimely  and  premature.  Human  judgment  is  quite  too  feeble 
for  such  a  subject;  but  how  can  we,  even  in  human  judgment,  regard 
his  departure  as  premature  whose  last  public  act  was  the  crowning 
glory  of  his  earthly  career? 

ADDRESS  OF  MR.  WALTON,  OF  VERMONT,  IN  HOUSE  OF 
REPRESENTATIVES,  WASHINGTON,  JULY  9,  1861. 

Mr.  Speaker:  While  many  states  are  to-day  assembled,  through 
their  representatives  in  the  Senate  and  this  House,  as  mourners  at  the 
loss  of  one  who  has  achieved  far  more  than  ordinary  honors  in 
the  public  service,  and  a  measure  of  popular  admiration  and  attach- 
ment accorded  to  but  few  statesmen  of  his  years  in  any  age  or  na- 
tion, there  is  one  state  distinguished  from  all  others — I  will  not  say 
by  the  sincerity  of  her  grief,  when  all  alike  are  sincerely  grieved,  but 
I  may  truly  say  for  the  singularity  of  her  grief.  A  mother  weeps  for 
her  son.  His  fame  was  national ;  Vermont  remembers  that  hers  is  the 
parental  share.  His  death,  in  the  very  crisis  of  a  nation's  fate,  was  a 
national  calamity ;  but  Vermont  remembers  that  her  loss  is  much  more 
than  the  common  share.  Her  son  is  dead.  She  clad  herself  in 
mourning  on  the  announcement  of  what  was,  to  human  judgment,  an 
untimely  death;  and  all  her  children  murmured  the  accents  of  sor- 

48 


row.  It  is  fit,  then,  to-day,  for  Vermont  to  join  in  these  funeral 
honors ;  and,  by  my  colleagues,  it  has  been  deemed  most  fit  that  I,  as 
the  representative  of  the  district  in  which  the  deceased  senator  was 
born,  and  the  people  among  whom  he  was  bred,  should  at  least  offer 
a  memorial  tribute,  however  humble  it  may  be. 

Stephen  Arnold  Douglas  was  born  in  Brandon,  Rutland  county, 
Vermont,  on  the  23rd  day  of  April,  1813.  Then,  more  than  now,  that 
was  a  rural  town;  and  though  the  father  was  a  physician  of  good 
culture  and  in  high  repute,  by  his  early  death  his  son  was  left  to 
those  privileges  only  which  the  poorest  can  command,  and  he  spent 
more  than  one-third  of  his  brief  but  eventful  life  attending  the  winter 
district  school,  and  laboring  steadily  during  the  remainder  of  his 
time  upon  a  farm  and  in  a  mechanic's  shop.  A  single  year  of  academ- 
ical studies,  being  the  eighteenth  year  of  his  life,  and  the  year  in  which 
he  received  his  bent  and  fixed  his  future  professional  career,  com- 
pleted the  preparation  given  according  to  the  then  common  usage  of 
Vermont.  It  was  no  mean  preparation;  for,  allowing  all  that  may  be 
due  to  the  peculiar  qualities  of  the  man — to  his  keen  and  powerful 
intellect,  his  unyielding  will,  and  that  audacity  of  bravery  which  dis- 
tinguished him  in  every  conflict — it  was  in  his  case  peculiarly  true, 
that  "the  boy  was  father  to  the  man" ;  that  the  bent  acquired  in  his 
youth,  from  the  institutions  and  influences  which  surrounded  him, 
marked  him  for  life. 

The  town  in  which  he  was  born,  like  every  other  in  Vermont, 
and  indeed  each  of  the  many  school  districts  in  the  town,  was  an  in- 
dependent corporation  for  its  appropriate  purposes,  with  what,  in 
strict  propriety,  may  be  called  legislative  powers,  such  as  taxation, 
and  the  regulation  of  various  matters  of  importance  to  the  town  and 
district;  and  the  legislature  of  each  was  not  a  representative  body, 
but  a  pure  democracy,  in  which  all  the  citizens  met  on  equal  terms  and 
with  an  equal  right  to  free  discussion  and  action.  These  are  priv- 
ileges which  touch  the  interests  of  all,  and  therefore  demand  intel- 
ligence, and  put  to  practical  and  constant  use  the  intellectual  and  moral 
qualities  of  the  people.  The  demand  stimulates  the  best  supply  to  be 
attained,  and  by  books  and  newspapers,  by  public  discussions  and  fire- 
side consultations,  that  supply  is  had.  The  fruit  is  an  independent, 
intelligent,  and  energetic  community,  thoughtful  of  public  affairs  and 

49 


familiar  with  public  duties;  a  community,  of  which  every  man  may 
tender  what  he  will  to  the  common  weal,  and  he  will  be  sure  to  be 
weighed  in  a  just  balance  and  counted  for  what  he  is  worth.  From 
such  a  school — the  same  in  kind  as  those  from  which  Vermont 
sends  her  sons  and  daughters  throughout  the  land — Stephen  A.  Doug- 
las went  out  a  Democrat,  as  every  native  born  and  bred  Vermonter 
is  a  Democrat.  I  say  it  in  the  strictest  and  purest  sense  of  the  word, 
not  in  a  party  sense,  though  in  his  case  that  was  true;  and  I  have 
sometimes  fancied  that  even  then  that  chord  was  strung  which  in  late 
years  sounded  the  rallying  cry  of  his  party — "the  freedom  of  the  peo- 
ple to  regulate  their  domestic  institutions  in  their  own  way." 

His  career  has  been  brilliant  beyond  all  other  examples  in  our 
political  history.  Swift  and  unbroken  was  his  march  from  the  ob- 
scurity of  his  old  rural  home  to  the  post  of  championship  in  the  Senate. 
Every  step  was  triumphal ;  and  every  triumph  gave  new  confidence, 
courage,  and  strength,  for  a  larger  endeavor  and  a  more  brilliant  vic- 
tory. Never  but  once,  and  at  the  last,  did  he  fail,  as  if  in  him  was  to 
be  the  proof  of  the  all  but  divine  insight  of  the  greatest  poet  of  our 
race:  "Checks  and  disasters 

Grow  in  the  veins  of  actions  highest  rear'd." 

No!  not  at  the  last.  I  recall  the  words.  The  last  trial  was 
indeed  his  greatest  victory.  It  has  been  the  boast  of  his  friends  that 
he  was  pre-eminently  a  party  man;  and  he  himself  undoubtedly  had 
the  fullest  faith  in  both  the  invincibility  and  virtue  of  the  party  of 
which  he  had  become  the  recognized  head.  More  than  others,  then, 
he  was  the  idol  for  party  homage,  and  more  than  others  the  target  to 
receive  the  shafts  of  party  prejudice  and  malignity.  If  this  be  true, 
sir,  his  last  conflict  was  with  himself — his  last  victory  the  noblest  for 
his  fame.  The  patriot  conquered  the  partisan.  The  last  cry  from  his 
trumpet  tongue  announced  the  supremacy  of  patriotism  over  party, 
and  summoned  the  legions  of  his  loyal  friends  to  the  rescue  of  the 
country;  and  his  dying  message  to  his  children  enjoined  perpetual 
fidelity  to  the  Constitution  and  the  Union.  We  mourn,  then,  not  alone 
that  a  great  man  has  fallen — we  bring  not  here  alone  the  cheap  offer- 
ings of  personal  or  party  grief — we  marshal  not  ourselves  as  friends 
and  foes,  bound  in  common  decency  to  suspend  the  clash  of  conflict 


for  the  burial  of  the  dead;  but,  bearing  the  heavy  burden  of  a  com- 
mon woe,  we  mingle  our  tears  over  a  patriot's  grave. 

Mr.  Speaker,  it  is  for  others,  who  have  been  personal  friends  of 
the  deceased,  to  utter  the  eulogies  and  sorrows  of  friendship;  for 
others,  who  have  been  his  associates  in  public  life,  to  do  justice  to 
his  public  services ;  but  for  Vermont,  let  me  say,  that  today  there  has 
been,  and  there  can  be,  no  measure  of  deserved  praise  that  shall  not 
touch  her  pride,  and  no  wail  of  unfeigned  sorrow  that  shall  not  reach 
her  heart. 


LETTER  FROM  JUDGE  ROBERT  M.  DOUGLAS. 

30  OCT.,  1913. 
HON.  F.  H.  FARRINGTON, 

Brandon,  Vt. 
My  Dear  Mr.  Farrington: 

I  deeply  appreciate  your  kindness  in  asking  me  to  recall  one  or 
two  incidents  of  my  father's  life  tending  to  show  its  leading  charac- 
teristics. 

In  my  published  letter  to  Mr.  Bowman  on  the  occasion  of  the 
semi-centennial  celebration  of  the  Lincoln-Douglas  Debates  at  Alton, 
I  recalled  the  fact  that  my  father  was  personally  opposed  to  slavery, 
and  showed  his  sincerity  by  refusing  a  valuable  gift  of  slave  property 
tendered  him  by  my  grandfather,  Robert  Martin,  a  wealthy  planter 
of  North  Carolina;  and  that  in  consequence  of  this  refusal,  Colonel 
Martin  provided  in  his  will  that  in  the  event  of  the  death  of  his 
daughter  without  children,  the  slaves  refused  by  Judge  Douglas  should 
be  sent  to  Liberia  at  the  expense  of  his  estate.  Judge  Douglas  could 
have  accepted  the  slaves,  sold  them,  and  invested  their  proceeds  in 
real  estate  in  Chicago ;  but  this  was  not  his  idea  of  emancipation.  He 
neither  wanted  a  slave  nor  the  proceeds  of  a  slave;  and  he  did  not 
think  it  was  any  worse  to  own  a  slave  than  to  sell  one. 

Stephen  A.  Douglas  was  elected  by  the  General  Assembly  an 
Associate  Judge  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Illinois  on  February  15, 
1841,  being  then  twenty-seven  years  of  age.  At  the  ensuing  July 
term  Mr.  Lincoln  brought  up  on  appeal  his  celebrated  case  of  David 
Bailey,  appellant  vs.  W.  Cromwell  et  al.,  Executors  of  Nathan  Crom- 
well, deceased,  appellees.  Mr.  Lincoln  appeared  for  Bailey,  who  was 

51 


resisting  the  collection  of  a  note  he  had  given  for  the  purchase  of  a 
negro  girl.  There  was  no  sufficient  evidence  that  the  girl  was  a 
slave,  and  her  fate  practically  depended  upon  the  legal  presumption 
as  to  color.  The  Supreme  Court  held  with  Mr.  Lincoln  that :  "It  is 
a  presumption  of  law  that  every  person  is  free  without  regard  to 
color."  The  opinion  was  written  by  the  Chief  Justice  and  concurred 
in  by  Judge  Douglas,  and  indeed  apparently  by  all  the  judges.  It 
seems  singular  that  Stephen  A.  Douglas  sustained  Abraham  Lincoln 
in  so  important  a  principle  of  human  freedom,  and  that  S.  T.  Logan, 
for  so  many  years  Mr.  Lincoln's  law  partner,  should  have  appeared 
in  that  case  against  Mr.  Lincoln,  contending  that  a  negro  was  legally 
presumed  to  be  a  slave  without  any  other  evidence  than  the  color  of 
his  skin.  This  case  was  reported  in  3  Scammon,  page  71.  Judge 
Douglas  also  concurred  in  the  opinion  of  the  court  in  Kinney  vs. 
Cook,  3  Scammon,  page  232.  And  yet  my  father  was  not  an  abolition- 
ist as  then  understood.  Having  taken  a  solemn  oath  to  obey  and 
support  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  he  did  not  feel  that  he 
had  any  right  to  interfere  with  slavery  wherever  it  lawfully  existed 
under  the  sanction  of  the  Federal  Constitution.  He  did  not  believe 
that  the  Declaration  of  Independence  referred  to  the  freedom  of 
slaves,  because  Jefferson,  who  wrote  it,  was  himself  a  slaveholder, 
and  every  delegate  who  signed  it  represented  a  slave  holding  State. 
While  several  States  had  sought  to  prevent  any  further  importation 
of  slaves,  and  one  or  two  had  enacted  some  legislation  looking  to 
future  emancipation,  yet  the  fact  remains  that  at  that  time  negroes 
to  a  greater  or  less  extent  were  actually  held  in  slavery  in  every 
State  of  the  Union.  It  is  true  Jefferson  looked  forward  to  the  ulti- 
mate freedom  of  the  negro ;  but  he  well  knew  that  at  that  time  forced 
emancipation  would  lead  to  civil  war.  None  realized  this  more  fully 
than  my  father,  whose  marriage  to  a  Southern  woman,  and  consequent 
visits  to  the  South,  brought  him  into  personal  contact  with  the  slave 
holding  class  in  their  homes.  For  instance,  Senator  Reid  of  North 
Carolina,  who  served  with  my  father  for  several  years  in  the  Senate, 
was  his  wife's  first  cousin  and  his  personal  friend,  but  his  political 
opponent.  My  father  had  no  misconception  of  the  length  and  magni- 
tude of  the  coming  war.  He  told  a  distinguished  citizen  of  Illinois, 
General  John  M.  Palmer:  "This  will  be  a  great  war.  It  will  last 

52 


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PATRIOTIC   LETTER   OF   SENATOR   DOUGLAS, 
NOW  FIRST  PUBLISHED. 


for  years.  This  continent  will  tremble  under  the  tread  of  a  million 
armed  men."  In  his  speech  at  Springfield  five  weeks  before  his  death, 
he  declared  that :  "The  shortest  way  to  peace  is  the  most  stupenduous 
and  unanimous  preparation  for  war."  He  dreaded  civil  war,  but 
heart  and  brain  re-echoed  the  slogan  of  his  old  hero,  Andrew  Jack- 
son, "Our  Federal  Union ;  it  must  be  preserved." 

A  quotation  from  a  letter  to  me  from  the  late  Melville  W.  Fuller, 
Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States,  may  here 
be  appropriate.  The  Chief  Justice  says:  "I  knew  your  lamented 
father  very  well.  Popular  as  he  was,  it  has  nevertheless  seemed  to  me 
that  the  extraordinary  abilities  he  possessed  have  never  been  fully 
appreciated.  The  slavery  question  compelled  his  attention,  and  so  the 
comprehensive  grasp  of  his  mind  did  not  get  full  opportunity  for 
expression  in  other  directions.  But  as  time  goes  on  I  think  the  im- 
pression of  his  real  greatness  deepens." 

Again  expressing  my  grateful  appreciation  of  your  generous  re- 
membrance, I  remain, 

Most  sincerely  yours, 

ROBERT  M.  DOUGLAS. 

UNPUBLISHED  LETTERS  OF  SENATOR  DOUGLAS. 

We  are  fortunate  in  having  secured  for  publication  the  following 
hitherto  unpublished  interesting  and  important  letters  of  Stephen 
A.  Douglas.  The  first  is  an  artful  electioneering  appeal  in  the  guise 
of  a  friendly  letter,  delicately  suggesting  to  his  friend  that  his  support 
of  his  candidacy  for  the  U.  S.  Senate  would  be  acceptable.  The 
second  is  a  letter  to  his  confidential  friend  and  representative,  C.  H. 
Lanphier,  editor  of  the  State  Register  at  Springfield,  111.,  on  the 
subject  of  some  campaign  slanders  which  had  been  circulated,  charg- 
ing Douglas  with  being  a  slave  holder  and  misrepresenting  his  slavery 
views.  He  encloses  a  suggested  editorial  in  refutation  of  these 
charges.  The  third  letter  is  dated  from  New  York  soon  after  his 
nomination  for  the  presidency,  and  shows  that  at  that  time  he  had 
strong  hopes  of  his  election.  All  of  these  letters  are  interesting — 
as  are  all  such  letters  of  distinguished  characters — in  exhibiting  his 
forms  of  expression  and  style  of  composition  in  intimate  personal 
letters. 

53 


TO    HON.    HALL    SIMS. 

CHARLESTON,  (!LL.)  Nov.  14,  1846. 
My  Dear  Sir : 

I  arrived  here  today  on  a  visit  to  the  Wabash  Counties,  yours 
included  among  the  number;  but  have  received  such  information  as 
will  compel  me  to  proceed  south  immediately  and  will  deprive  me  of 
the  pleasure  of  seeing  you.  You  are  aware  that  my  name  will  be 
presented  to  the  Legislature  this  winter  as  a  candidate  for  the  U.  S. 
Senate.  My  present  object  is  not  to  electioneer  with  you;  for  our 
long  acquaintance  and  your  former  friendship  would  seem  to  render 
this  unnecessary.  Yet  I  would  have  been  glad  to  have  seen  you 
at  your  own  house,  &  have  spent  a  pleasant  evening  in  talking  over 
old  times.  I  am  not  aware  that  I  will  have  any  opposition.  There 
have  been  rumors  that  Col.  McClernand  will  be  a  candidate,  but  I 
have  just  learned  that  he  will  not  run.  As  he  has  declined  I  know  of 
no  candidate  on  the  track  but  myself.  I  have  heard  some  rumors 
that  a  secret  arrangement  has  been  entered  into  by  a  few  persons  to 
bring  out  a  candidate  after  I  leave  for  Washington;  but  I  discredit 
such  reports,  for  the  unfairness  of  the  thing  would  certainly  defeat 
the  success  of  the  scheme.  Of  course  I  would  dislike  to  be  beaten 
by  such  an  arrangement,  as  it  would  greatly  injure  my  standing  in 
the  House  and  before  the  country.  As  I  must  be  absent,  I  must  rely 
solely  on  the  activity  and  vigilance  of  my  friends.  I  bear  you  in 
grateful  remembrance  for  your  friendship  for  me  on  former  occasions, 
and  expect  now  to  be  placed  under  additional  obligations  to  you. 
I  shall  be  happy  to  hear  from  you  often,  and  to  render  you  any  service 
in  my  power  at  Washington. 

Your  friend, 
Hon.  Hall  Sims.  S.  A.  DOUGLAS. 

TO    C.    H.    LANPHIER. 

(Confidential) 

WASHINGTON,  AUGUST  3D,  1850. 
Dear  Sir: 

I  herewith  send  you  a  manuscript  in  strict  confidence.  If  you 
deem  it  wise  &  prudent  you  can  modify  it  to  suit  you  &  copy  it  & 

54 


publish  it  editorially.  I  leave  it  entirely  to  your  discretion,  but  to  be 
shown  to  no  one  else.  I  desire  you  to  destroy  this  copy  in  my  hand- 
writing. You  have  doubtless  seen  the  article  in  the  Quincy  Whig 
to  which  I  refer.  It  will  undoubtedly  be  published  in  all  whig  and 
abolition  papers  in  the  state.  You  can  rely  implicitly  upon  the  law 
of  the  case  as  stated  in  the  article  I  send,  can  find  the  laws  of 
Mississippi  to  the  same  effect  (in)  the  office  of  Secy  of  State.  I 
believe  the  article  was  got  up  in  Springfield  or  by  Baker  here  &  sent 
to  Bledsoe  who  formerly  edited  the  Journal  &  now  is  a  professor  in 
a  college  in  Miss.  I  am  not  certain  on  this  point  so  it  will  not  do  to 
charge  it  direct.  It  is  true  that  my  wife  does  own  about  150  negroes 
in  Miss  &  a  cotton  plantation.  My  father-in-law  in  his  lifetime 
offered  them  to  me  &  I  refused  to  accept  them.  This  fact  is  stated 
in  his  will,  but  I  do  not  wish  it  brought  before  the  public  as  the  public 
have  no  business  with  my  private  affairs,  and  besides  everybody  would 
see  that  the  information  must  have  come  from  me.  My  wife  has  no 
negroes  except  those  in  Miss.  We  have  other  property  in  North 
Carolina,  but  no  negroes.  It  is  our  intention  however  to  remove  all 
our  property  to  Illinois  as  soon  as  possible.  I  put  these  facts  in  your 
possession  &  trust  entirely  to  your  discretion. 

I  will  close  this  letter  here  &  write  you  another  by  this  mail  about 
politics. 

Your  friend, 
C.  H.  Lanphier,  Esq.  S.  A.  DOUGLAS. 

THE   MANUSCRIPT  ENCLOSED  IN  THE  PRECEDING  LETTER. 

The  Quincy  Whig  and  other  whig  papers  are  publishing  an  article 
purporting  to  be  copied  from  a  Mississippi  paper  abusing  Judge 
Douglas  as  the  owner  of  100  slaves,  and  at  the  same  time  accusing 
him  of  being  a  Wilmot  Freesoiler.  That  the  article  originated  in  this 
state,  and  was  sent  to  Mississippi  for  publication  in  order  that  it  might 
be  republished  here  we  shall  not  question  nor  take  the  trouble  to  prove. 
The  paternity  of  the  article,  the  motive  that  prompted  it,  and  the 
misrepresentations  it  contains  are  too  obvious  to  require  particular 
notice.  If  it  had  been  written  by  a  Mississipian  he  would  have  known 
that  the  statement  in  regard  to  the  ownership  of  the  negroes  was 


totally  untrue.  No  one  will  pretend  that  Judge  Douglas  has  any 
other  property  in  Mississippi  than  that  which  was  acquired  in  the 
right  of  his  wife  by  inheritance  upon  the  death  of  her  father,  and 
anyone  who  will  take  the  trouble  to  examine  the  statutes  of  that 
State  in  the  Secretary's  office  in  this  city  will  find  that  by  the  laws  of 
Mississippi  all  the  property  of  a  married  woman,  whether  acquired 
by  will,  gift,  or  otherwise,  becomes  her  separate  and  exclusive  estate 
and  is  not  subject  to  the  control  or  disposal  of  her  husband  nor  sub- 
ject to  his  debts.  We  do  not  pretend  to  know  whether  the  father 
of  Mrs.  Douglas  at  the  time  of  his  death  owned  slaves  in  Mississippi 
or  not.  We  have  heard  the  statement  made  by  the  whigs  but  have 
not  deemed  it  of  sufficient  importance  to  inquire  into  its  truth.  If  it 
should  turn  out  so  in  no  event  could  Judge  Douglas  become  the 
owner  or  have  the  disposal  of  or  be  responsible  for  them.  The  laws 
of  the  State  forbid  it,  and  also  forbid  slaves  under  such  circumstances 
from  being  removed  without  or  emancipated  within  the  limits  of  the 
State.  But  one  chief  object  in  referring  to  the  article  in  question  was 
to  correct  a  gross  misrepresentation  in  regard  to  Judge  Douglas's 
opinions  upon  the  slavery  question.  He  is  charged  with  pretending 
to  be  a  Freesoiler  and  a  Wilmot  Proviso  man.  There  is  not  a  man  in 
the  (state)  who  does  not  know  this  charge  to  be  utterly  false.  He 
always  voted  against  the  Wilmot  Proviso  from  the  time  it  was  first 
introduced  until  it  was  finally  killed  in  the  Senate  by  the  ratification 
of  the  treaty.  He  has  always  advocated  the  right  of  the  people  in 
each  State  and  Territory  to  decide  the  slavery  question  for  themselves. 
When  he  voted  for  the  prohibition  of  slavery  in  the  territorial  Bills 
this  session  he  declared  that  he  did  so  in  obedience  to  instructions  and 
that  the  vote  was  the  vote  of  those  who  gave  the  instructions  and  not 
his  own.  His  opinions  and  principles  have  been  uniform  and  con- 
sistent upon  this  question.  The  Whigs  combined  with  the  Free- 
soilers  to  pass  the  instructions  and  now  denounce  him  for  yielding 
obedience  to  them. 

TO  C.   H.  LANPHIER. 

(Private) 
My  Dear  Sir :  NEW  YORK,  JULY  STH,  1860. 

It  will  be  necessary  for  me  to  remain  here  some  time  to  perfect 
our  organization  throughout  the  Union.     In  the  mean  time  it  is  indis- 

56 


pensable  that  our  friends  shall  organize  every  county  in  Illinois  thor- 
oughly and  open  the  canvass  with  vigor  and  energy.  No  time  must 
be  lost,  and  no  effort  spared.  Our  friends  here  are  in  good  spirits. 
We  must  make  the  war  boldly  against  the  Northern  abolitionists  and 
the  Southern  Disunionists,  and  give  no  quarter  to  either.  We  should 
treat  the  Bell  and  Everett  men  kindly  and  cultivate  good  relations 
with  them,  for  they  are  Union  men.  According  to  present  appear- 
ances Breckenridge  cannot  carry  a  single  state,  except  South  Carolina, 
and  perhaps  Miss.  Bell  will  probably  carry  Kentucky,  Tennessee, 
North  Carolina,  Virginia,  Maryland  &  Delaware.  We  shall  probably 
carry  Missouri,  Arkansas,  Louisiana,  Texas,  Alabama  &  Georgia  in 
the  South,  and  hope  to  get  enough  more  in  the  free  States  to  be  elected 
by  the  people.  We  can  have  no  partnership  with  the  Bolters.  If  the 
election  goes  to  the  Ho  of  Reps,  Lincoln,  Bell  and  myself  will  be  the 
three  highest.  If  it  goes  to  the  Senate  Hamlin  &  Johnson  will  be 
the  two  highest.  So  you  see  that  Breckenridge  &  Lane  can  have  no 
show  in  any  event. 

Richardson  has  just  returned  from  New  England,  and  reports 
very  favorable.  He  thinks  we  will  carry  Maine,  New  Hampshire, 
Rhode  Island  &  Conn.  In  New  York  our  friends  are  confident  of 
carrying  the  State,  and  also  in  New  Jersey.  We  hope  for  the  best 
in  Penn. 

Now  organize  &  rally  in  111.  &  the  North  West.  The  changes 
in  our  favor  are  enormous  in  the  East.  Organize  the  State. 

Yours  truly, 
C.  H.  Lanphier,  Esq.  S.  A.  DOUGLAS. 


It  may  be  of  interest  to  compare  Senator  Douglas's  rosy  prog- 
nostications at  the  opening  of  the  campaign  with  the  actual  results. 
Lincoln  received  180  electoral  votes,  Breckenridge  72,  Bell  39,  and 
Douglas  12.  Yet  Douglas  stood  second  in  the  popular  vote,  having 
almost  as  many  votes  as  Breckenridge  and  Bell  combined. 


AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL  SKETCH  OF  STEPHEN  A.  DOUGLAS. 

SEPT.  1,  1838. 

I  this  day  commence  this  memorandum  or  journal  of  passing 
events  for  the  purpose  of  refreshing  my  mind  in  future  upon  sub- 
jects that  might  otherwise  be  forgotten.  It  may  be  well  to  turn  my 
attention  to  the  past  as  well  as  the  future,  and  record  such  facts  as 
are  within  my  recollection  or  have  come  to  my  knowledge,  and  may 
be  interesting  or  useful  to  myself  or  others  hereafter. 

I  learn  from  my  mother  that  I  was  born  in  the  town  of  Brandon, 
in  the  County  of  Rutland,  and  State  of  Vermont  on  the  23d  day  of 
April,  1813.  My  father,  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  was  a  graduate  of 
Middlebury  College,  a  physician  by  profession,  and  a  man  very  much 
beloved  by  all  who  knew  him.  I  only  speak  of  my  father  as  I  have 
always  heard  others  speak  of  him,  for  he  died  when  I  was  only  about 
two  months  old,  and  of  course,  I  cannot  recollect  him.  I  have  often 
been  told  that  he  was  holding  me  in  his  arms  when  he  departed  this 
world.  My  mother,  who  thank  God  yet  lives,  was  a  Miss  Sarah 
Fisk  before  she  was  married.  My  parents  had  but  two  children,  my 
sister  Sarah  A.  Douglas  (who  has  since  married  Julius  N.  Granger, 
of  Manchester  Centre,  Ontario  County,  N.  Y.)  and  myself.  Upon 
the  death  of  my  father,  my  mother  moved  to  a  small  farm  left  her  by 
her  father  about  three  miles  north  of  my  native  village,  and  resided 
with  her  brother,  Edward  Fisk,  who  was  an  industrious,  economical, 
clever  old  bachelor,  and  wanted  some  one  to  keep  house  for  him. 
This  arrangement  suited  them  both  as  their  farms  joined,  and  each 
was  so  situated  as  to  need  the  aid  of  the  other.  Here  I  lived  with 
my  mother  and  uncle  upon  the  farm  until  I  was  about  fifteen  years 
of  age,  and  then  determined  to  select  some  other  mode  of  living. 
I  had  no  great  aversion  to  working  on  a  farm,  nor  was  I  much  dis- 
satisfied with  my  uncle,  but  thought  him  rather  a  hard  master,  and 
unwilling  to  give  me  those  opportunities  of  improvement  and  educa- 
tion which  I  thought  I  was  entitled  to.  I  had  enjoyed  the  benefits 
of  a  common  school  education  three  months  each  year,  and  had  been 
kept  diligently  at  work  the  rest  of  the  time.  I  thought  it  a  hard- 
ship that  my  uncle  would  have  the  use  of  my  mother's  farm  and 
also  the  benefit  of  my  labor  without  any  other  equivalent  than  my 
boarding  and  clothes.  I  therefore  determined  upon  leaving  my  home 

58 


and  my  true  friends,  and  see  what  I  could  do  for  myself  in  the  wide 
world  among  strangers.  My  mother  remonstrated,  warned  me  of  the 
dangers  and  temptations  to  which  young  men  are  exposed,  and  insisted 
upon  my  selecting  some  trade  or  engaging  in  some  business  that  would 
give  me  a  steady  home  and  regular  employment.  I  promised  to  com- 
ply with  her  wishes,  that  is,  keep  good  company,  or  in  other  words, 
keep  out  of  bad  company,  avoid  all  immoral  and  vicious  practices, 
attend  church  regularly,  and  obey  the  regulations  of  my  employer; 
in  short  I  promised  everything  she  wanted,  if  she  would  consent  to  my 
leaving  home.  Accordingly  in  the  Spring  of  1828,  being  about 
fifteen  years  of  age,  I  bid  my  mother,  sister  and  uncle  farewell,  and 
left  home  for  Middlebury,  about  fourteen  miles  distant,  and  engaged 
to  learn  the  cabinet  making  trade  with  one  Nahum  Parker.  I  put 
on  my  apron  and  went  to  work,  sawing  table  legs  from  two  inch 
plank,  making  wash  stands,  bed  steads,  &c.,  &c.  I  was  delighted 
with  the  change  of  home  and  employment.  There  was  a  novelty  about 
it  that  rendered  it  peculiarly  interesting.  My  labor  furnished  exercise 
for  the  mind  as  well  as  the  body.  I  have  never  been  placed  in  any 
situation  or  been  engaged  in  any  business  which  I  enjoyed  to  so  great 
an  extent  as  the  cabinet  shop.  I  then  felt  contented  and  happy,  and 
never  aspired  to  any  other  distinction  than  that  connected  with  my 
trade  and  improvements  in  the  arts.  Towards  the  end  of  the  year 
I  became  dissatisfied  with  my  employer  in  consequence  of  his  insist- 
ing upon  my  performing  some  menial  services  in  the  house.  I  was 
willing  to  do  anything  connected  with  the  shop  but  could  not  consent 
to  perform  the  duties  of  a  servant  in  the  house.  A  difficulty  soon 
arose  between  Mr.  Parker  and  his  wife  and  myself,  and  resulted  in 
my  leaving  him  and  returning  home.  So  much  was  I  attached  to  the 
life  of  a  mechanic,  I  could  not  content  myself  at  home  and  soon  got 
a  situation  in  the  shop  of  Deacon  Caleb  Knowlton,  a  cabinet  maker 
in  Brandon,  my  native  village.  I  remained  with  my  new  employer 
about  a  year,  and  pursued  my  business  strictly,  as  all  the  apprentices 
in  the  shop  were  required  to  do.  Whilst  I  lived  with  Mr.  Parker  I 
formed  a  taste  for  reading,  particularly  political  works,  by  being 
associated  with  a  number  of  young  men  who  spent  their  time  nights 
and  Sundays  in  reading  and  study.  At  this  time  politics  ran  high  in 
the  presidential  election  between  General  Jackson  and  J.  Q.  Adams. 

59 


My  associate  apprentices  and  myself  were  warm  advocates  of  Gen. 
Jackson's  claims,  whilst  our  employer  was  an  ardent  supporter  of  Mr. 
Adams  and  Mr.  Clay.  From  this  moment  my  politics  became  fixed, 
and  all  subsequent  reading,  reflection  and  observation  have  but  con- 
firmed my  early  attachment  to  the  cause  of  Democracy. 

In  the  winter  of  1829  and  1830  I  was  taken  sick  and  compelled 
to  return  home.  My  physicians  informed  me  that  my  physical 
strength  was  too  feeble  to  enable  me  to  work  at  the  cabinet  business, 
and  that  it  would  be  necessary  for  me  to  select  some  other  occupation. 
Finding  my  health  too  feeble  to  work  in  the  shop,  I  commenced  going 
to  school  at  the  Academy  in  Brandon,  under  the  direction  of  J.  N. 
Chipman,  and  continued  under  his  instruction  until  the  fall  of  1830, 
when  I  removed  to  Canandaigua,  Ontario  County,  N.  Y.  My  sister 
had  previously  married  Julius  N.  Granger,  and  removed  to  his  resi- 
dence in  Manchester  Centre,  Ontario  County,  N.  Y.,  and  this  year, 
1830,  my  mother  married  his  father;  and  now  the  father  and  mother 
and  only  son  and  only  daughter  became  united  in  one  family  where 
they  continue  to  reside  in  the  enjoyment  of  peace,  plenty  and  happiness. 
Upon  removing  to  the  State  of  New  York  in  December,  1830,  I  be- 
came a  student  in  the  Academy  of  Canandaigua  under  the  superintend- 
ence of  Prof.  Henry  Howe,  where  I  continued  until  the  latter  part 
of  1832.  Whilst  connected  with  the  Academy  at  Canandaigua  I  de- 
voted myself  zealously  to  my  studies,  the  Greek  and  Latin  languages, 
mathematics,  rhetoric,  logic,  &c.,  and  made  considerable  improvement. 

About  the  1st  of  January,  1833,  I  left  the  Academy  and  entered 
the  office  of  Walter  &  Levi  Hubbell  as  a  student  at  law.  I  pursued 
my  law  studies  diligently  five  days  in  the  week,  and  the  sixth  I  spent 
in  reviewing  my  classical  studies,  until  sometime  in  the  month  of 
June  in  that  year.  Finding  myself  in  straightened  pecuniary  circum- 
stances, and  knowing  my  mother's  inability  to  support  me  through  a 
regular  course  of  law  studies,  which  would  continue  about  four  years 
longer,  according  to  the  statutes  of  New  York,  requiring  a  course  of 
seven  years  classical  and  legal  study  before  admission  to  the  bar,  I 
determined  upon  removing  to  the  western  country  and  relying  upon 
my  own  efforts  for  a  support  henceforth.  My  mother  and  relatives 
remonstrated,  urging  that  I  was  too  young  and  inexperienced  for  such 
an  adventure ;  but  finding  my  resolution  fixed  and  unchangeable,  they 


reluctantly  consented,  and  kindly  furnished  me  with  three  hundred 
dollars,  the  last  of  my  patrimony,  with  which  to  pay  my  expenses. 
On  the  24th  of  June,  1833  (being  20  years  of  age)  I  bid  farewell  to 
my  friends,  and  started  alone  for  the  "great  West,"  without  having 
any  particular  place  of  destination  in  view.  The  first  night  I  arrived 
at  Buffalo,  and  thence  took  a  trip  to  the  Battle  Grounds  of  Chippewa, 
Niagara,  the  Falls,  &c.,  &c.,  and  returning  to  Buffalo  in  a  few  days,  I 
embarked  on  a  steam  boat  for  Cleveland,  Ohio.  Arriving  at  Cleveland 
I  presented  a  few  letters  of  introduction  to  some  gentlemen  of  that 
place  which  I  had  received  from  Messrs.  Francis  Granger,  Mark  H. 
Sibley  and  other  kind  friends.  By  means  of  these  letters  I  immediately 
became  acquainted  with  Sherlock  J.  Andrews,  Esq.,  an  accomplished 
and  intelligent  gentleman  and  distinguished  lawyer  of  that  city.  Being 
pleased  with  Cleveland  and  its  prospects  for  business,  and  also  with 
the  few  acquaintances  I  formed  there,  I  immediately  determined  upon 
remaining  there.  By  the  statutes  of  Ohio  I  was,  required  to  pursue 
the  study  of  law  one  year  within  the  limits  of  that  State  before  I 
could  be  admitted  to  practice.  For  this  purpose  Mr.  Andrews  was 
kind  enough  to  offer  me  the  use  of  his  office  and  library,  which  I  gladly 
accepted,  and  entered  upon  my  studies  with  increased  spirit  and  zeal. 
In  a  very  few  days,  however,  I  found  myself  prostrate  upon  my  bed 
with  the  bilious  fever,  and  was  confined  until  some  time  in  the  month 
of  October,  about  four  months.  This  sickness  has  often  since  been, 
and  still  continues  to  be,  the  subject  of  the  most  serious  and  profound 
reflection.  My  condition,  the  circumstances  with  which  I  was  sur- 
rounded, the  doubtful  and  sometimes  hopeless  issue,  and  especially  my 
feelings,  thoughts,  and  meditations,  are  all  now  fresh  in  my  mind. 
I  was  among  entire  strangers.  During  the  whole  time  I  never  saw  a 
face  I  had  ever  seen  before ;  I  was  so  feeble  as  to  be  entirely  helpless, 
unable  even  to  turn  myself  in  bed;  I  was  advised  by  my  physicians 
that  there  was  no  reasonable  hope  of  my  recovery,  and  that  I  ought 
to  be  prepared  for  my  final  dissolution  which  was  then  expected  to 
take  place  from  day  to  day.  I  was  in  the  full  enjoyment  of  my 
senses,  perfectly  conscious  of  my  condition,  and  listened  patiently  and 
calmly  to  all  they  told  me,  and  felt  perfectly  indifferent  as  to  the 
result.  I  felt  satisfied  with  the  past  and  no  particular  hopes  or  appre- 
hensions of  the  future.  I  thought  I  was  on  the  dividing  line  between 

01 


this  world  and  the  next,  must  continue  to  exist  in  the  one  or  the 
other,  was  willing  to  take  either,  and  felt  no  choice  which.  In  short, 
during  that  four  months  of  severe  sickness,  I  enjoyed  more  peace  and 
contentment  of  mind,  more  perfect  freedom  from  all  care  and 
trouble,  except  occasional  bodily  pain,  and  more  negative  happiness 
than  during  any  other  similar  period  of  my  life. 

That  such  should  have  been  the  state  of  my  mind  under  such 
peculiar  and  trying  circumstances,  has  ever  been  to  me  the  subject 
of  curiosity,  wonder  and  amazement.  I  can  account  for  it  upon  no 
principle  of  philosophy  or  human  nature,  and  now  make  this  private 
record  of  the  same  for  the  purpose  of  seeing  if  future  experience  and 
observation  shall  solve  the  mystery. 

Upon  regaining  my  strength  in  the  month  of  October  so  far  as 
to  be  able  to  walk,  I  paid  off  all  my  bills  occasioned  by  my  sickness 
or  otherwise  and  found  I  had  about  $40.00  left.  I  then  became 
reckless  and  adventurous,  and  determined  to  leave  the  place.  Ac- 
cordingly I  took  passage  on  a  canal  boat  for  Portsmouth  on  the  Ohio 
River,  thence  on  a  steam  boat  to  Cincinnati,  thence  to  Louisville,  thence 
to  St.  Louis,  Mo.,  remaining  in  each  place  a  few  days,  without  any 
particular  object  in  view,  and  ready  to  embark  in  any  adventure 
adapted  to  my  taste  and  feeling  which  should  present  itself. 

At  St.  Louis  I  soon  found  my  small  pittance  of  money  was 
about  exhausted,  and  that  I  must  immediately  engage  in  some  employ- 
ment there  which  would  defray  my  expenses,  or  go  to  some  place  not 
far  distant  where  I  could  do  so.  My  first  effort  was  to  obtain  a 
situation  in  some  law  office  in  the  city,  where  I  could  write  and  per- 
form office  labor  sufficient  to  pay  my  expenses,  and  during  the  rest  of 
the  time  pursue  my  law  studies.  Here  a  difficulty  presented  itself 
which  I  had  not  foreseen  and  guarded  against.  I  was  more  than  a 
thousand  miles  from  home,  or  from  any  person  whom  I  knew  or  who 
knew  me,  and  had  no  letters  of  introduction.  Perceiving  this  difficulty 
I  felt  great  delicacy  in  offering  my  services.  Stern  and  impending 
necessity  staring  me  in  the  face,  I  resolved  at  all  hazards  to  make  the 
effort.  I  first  called  on  Mr.  Bates,  introduced  myself  and  told  him 
my  business  and  situation.  He  received  and  treated  me  kindly  and 
politely;  and  informed  me  that  he  had  nothing  for  me  to  do;  but 
would  be  happy  to  see  me  at  his  office,  &c.,  for  all  which  I  tendered 
him  my  grateful  acknowledgements  and  retired. 

62 


After  making  a  similar  effort  with  like  success  with  Mr.  Spaul- 
ding,  I  paid  my  tavern  bill  and  left  the  city,  going  to  Jacksonville, 
Illinois. 

At  Jacksonville  I  formed  a  few  acquaintances  and  attempted  to 
get  into  business  of  some  kind,  say  teaching  school,  clerking,  &c.,  but 
without  success.  When  I  arrived  at  Jacksonville  I  had  left  one  dollar 
and  twenty-five  cents  in  money,  and  finding  that  would  not  pay  my 
board  more  than  one  day  at  the  tavern,  I  sold  a  few  school  books  I 
had  with  me  for  a  few  dollars,  and  took  up  my  lodgings  at  a  private 
house,  Mr.  Heslip's,  whose  family  I  have  known  and  esteemed  ever 
since.  One  of  my  first  acquaintances  at  Jacksonville  was  Murray 
McConnel,  Esq.,  a  lawyer  of  some  reputation,  who  advised  me  to 
go  to  Pekin  on  the  Illinois  River  and  open  a  law  office.  I  informed 
him  that  I  had  never  practiced  law,  had  not  yet  procured  my  license, 
nor  had  I  any  library.  He  informed  me  that  he  would  furnish  me 
with  a  few  books,  such  as  I  would  stand  in  the  most  need  of  im- 
mediately, and  wait  for  the  pay  until  I  was  able  to  pay  him,  and  did 
so  to  the  amount  of  $30.00  worth,  which  I  received  and  subsequently 
paid  him  for.  He  told  me  that  a  license  was  a  matter  of  no  con- 
sequence, that  I  could  practice  before  a  justice  of  the  peace  without 
one,  and  could  get  one  at  any  time  I  desired  to  do  so.  I  concluded  to 
take  his  advice,  and  consequently  packed  up  my  things  and  went  to 
Meredosia  on  the  Illinois  River  to  take  a  steam  boat  to  Pekin.  Arriv- 
ing at  the  river,  I  waited  one  week  for  a  steam  boat,  and  then  learned 
that  the  only  boat  which  was  expected  up  the  river  that  season  had 
blown  up  at  Alton,  and  consequently  there  would  be  no  boat  up  until 
the  next  spring.  What  was  now  to  be  done?  After  paying  my  bill  at  the 
tavern,  I  had  but  fifty  cents  left.  I  could  find  nothing  to  do  there, 
and  had  no  money  to  get  away  with.  Something  must  be  done,  and 
that  soon.  I  enquired  as  to  the  prospect  of  getting  a  school,  and  was 
told  by  a  farmer  residing  in  the  country  a  few  miles  that  he  thought 
that  I  could  obtain  one  at  Exeter,  about  ten  miles  distant;  and  if  I 
would  go  home  with  him  that  night,  he  would  go  to  Exeter  with  me 
the  next  day.  I  accepted  his  invitation,  left  my  trunk  at  Meredosia, 
rode  behind  the  farmer  on  the  same  horse  to  his  home,  and  the  next 
day  we  both  went  to  Exeter.  He  introduced  me  to  several  citizens 
who  were  very  polite  and  kind;  but  did  not  think  a  school  could  be 


obtained  there;  but  if  I  would  go  to  Winchester,  eight  or  ten  miles 
further  they  had  no  doubt  I  would  succeed  in  obtaining  one.  I 
thought  this  was  rather  poor  encouragement;  but  what  was  to  be 
done?  I  was  out  of  money,  and  still  in  too  feeble  health  to  perform 
any  very  arduous  labor ;  and  must  do  something  to  live ;  for  I  was  too 
proud  to  beg.  I  therefore  determined  to  go  to  Winchester  and  make 
another  effort.  Accordingly  I  parted  with  my  friend,  the  kind  hearted, 
hospitable  farmer  and  taking  my  cloak  on  my  arm,  went  to  Win- 
chester on  foot  that  night.  Arriving  in  town,  I  went  to  the  only  tavern 
in  the  place,  introduced  myself  to  the  landlord  and  told  him  I  wished 
to  stop  a  few  days  with  him  to  which  he  readily  assented.  The  land- 
lord introduced  me  to  the  citizens  generally,  who  seemed  pleased  with 
the  idea  of  a  new  school  in  their  little  town,  and  in  a-  few  days  ob- 
tained for  me  a  subscription  list  of  about  forty  scholars.  In  the  mean- 
time there  was,  on  the  second  day  after  my  arrival,  an  administrator's 
sale,  at  which  all  the  personal  property  of  a  dead  man's  estate  was  to 
be  disposed  of  at  auction,  and  the  administrator  applied  to  me  to  be 
clerk  at  the  auction,  make  out  the  sale  bills,  draw  the  notes,  &c.,  which 
I  very  cheerfully  consented  to  do,  and  performed  the  duty  in  the 
best  style  I  knew  how,  and  received  five  dollars  for  two  days  labor 
therein.  About  the  1st  of  December  I  commenced  my  school,  and 
closed  it  about  the  1st  of  March,  having  during  the  whole  time  a  goodly 
number  of  scholars,  and  giving  as  I  believe  general  satisfaction  to  both 
scholars  and  parents.  During  this  period  I  attended  to  considerable 
law  business  before  justices  of  the  peace,  and  formed  an  extensive 
acquaintance  with  the  people  in  that  part  of  the  country.  There  was 
considerable  political  excitement  growing  out  of  the  veto  of  the  U.  S. 
Bank  and  the  removal  of  the  deposits  by  Gen.  Jackson,  or  rather  the 
removal  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  because  he  would  not  remove 
the  deposits,  and  the  appointment  of  Mr.  Taney  in  his  place  who  did 
remove  them  from  the  vaults  of  the  U.  S.  Bank.  One  evening  at  the 
Lyceum,  Mr.  Josiah  Lambert,  a  lawyer  of  some  distinction  from 
Jacksonville,  made  a  speech,  denouncing  the  leading  measures  of  Gen. 
Jackson's  administration,  and  especially  the  veto  and  removal  of  the 
deposits.  He  characterized  the  first  of  those  acts  as  arbitrary  and 
tyrannical,  and  the  last  as  dangerous  and  unconstitutional.  Being  a 
great  admirer  of  Gen.  Jackson's  public  and  political  character  and  a 

64 


warm  supporter  of  the  principles  of  his  administration,  I  could  not 
remain  silent  when  the  old  hero's  character,  public  and  private,  was 
traduced,  and  his  measures  misrepresented  and  denounced.  I  was 
then  familiar  with  all  the  principles,  measures  and  facts  involved  in 
the  controversy,  having  been  an  attentive  reader  of  the  debates  in 
Congress  and  the  principal  newspapers  of  the  day,  and  having  read 
also  with  great  interest,  the  principal  works  in  this  country;  such  as 
the  debates  in  the  convention  that  formed  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  and  the  convention  of  the  several  states  on  the  adoption 
of  the  Constitution,  the  Federalist,  John  Adams'  work  denominated  a 
defense  of  the  American  Constitution,  the  opinions  of  Randolph, 
Hamilton  and  Jefferson  on  the  Constitutionality  of  the  Bank,  and  the 
History  of  the  Bank  as  published  by  Gales  &  Seaton,  Jefferson's 
Works,  &c.  I  had  read  all  of  them  and  many  other  political 
works  with  great  care  and  interest  and  had  my  political  opinions 
firmly  established.  I  engaged  in  the  debate  with  a  good  deal  of  zeal 
and  warmth,  and  defended  the  administration  of  Gen.  Jackson  and  the 
cause  of  the  Democratic  party  in  a  manner  which  appeared  highly 
gratifying  to  my  political  friends,  and  which  certainly  gave  me  some 
little  reputation  as  a  public  speaker ;  much  more  than  I  deserved. 

When  the  first  quarter  of  my  school  expired  I  settled  my  ac- 
counts, and  finding  that  I  had  made  enough  to  pay  my  expenses,  I 
determined  to  remove  to  Jacksonville,  the  county  seat  of  the  same 
(Morgan)  county,  and  commence  the  practice  of  the  law.  In  the  month 
of  March  I  applied  to  the  Hon.  Samuel  D.  Lockwood,  one  of  the 
justices  of  the  Supreme  Court,  and  after  a  short  examination,  obtained 
a  license,  and  immediately  opened  an  office,  being  then  less  than  twen- 
ty-one years  of  age.  During  the  first  week  of  my  residence  at  Jack- 
sonville the  Whig  (alias  Federal  party)  called  a  county  meeting,  and 
made  speeches  and  passed  resolutions  denouncing  the  administration 
in  the  severest  terms,  and  more  especially  in  relation  to  the  bank  and 
currency  question.  The  next  week  the  Democrats  called  a  meeting, 
one  of  the  most  numerous  and  spirited  I  have  ever  witnessed  in  that 
county.  It  was  composed  principally  of  farmers  and  mechanics,  men 
who  are  honest  in  their  political  sentiments  and  feel  a  deep  interest 
in  the  proper  administration  of  the  public  affairs,  although  but  few 
of  them  are  accustomed  to  public  discussion.  It  so  happened  that  at 

65 


that  time  out  of  twelve  members  of  the  bar  there  was  not  a  Democrat 
among  them.  This  meeting  I  attended,  and  at  the  earnest  solicitation 
of  my  political  friends  (for  personal  friends  I  had  not  then  had  time 
to  form),  I  consented  to  make  a  speech.  The  excitement  was  intense, 
and  I  was  rather  severe  in  my  remarks  upon  the  opposition ;  so  much 
so  as  to  excite  the  bitter  hostility  of  the  whole  of  that  party,  and  of 
course  the  warm  support  of  my  own  party.  The  next  week  the 
Patriot,  the  organ  of  the  opposition  printed  and  published  by  James 
G.  Edwards,  Esq.,  devoted  two  entire  columns  of  that  paper  to  me 
and  my  speech,  and  continued  the  same  course  for  two  or  three  suc- 
cessive weeks.  The  necessary  consequence  was  that  I  immediately  be- 
came known  to  every  man  in  the  county,  and  was  placed  in  such  a 
situation  as  to  be  supported  by  one  party  and  opposed  by  the  other. 
This  notoriety,  acquired  by  accident  and  founded  on  no  peculiar  merit, 
proved  highly  serviceable  to  me  in  my  profession ;  for  within  one  week 
thereafter  I  received  for  collection  demands  to  the  amount  of  thou- 
sands of  dollars  from  persons  I  had  never  seen  or  heard  of,  and  who 
would  not  probably  have  known  that  such  a  person  as  myself  was  in 
existence,  but  for  the  attacks  upon  me  in  the  opposition  papers.  So 
essential  was  the  service  thus  rendered  me  by  my  opponents  that  I 
have  sometimes  doubted  whether  I  was  not  morally  bound  to  pay  the 
editor  for  his  abuse  according  to  the  usual  prices  of  advertisements. 
This  incident  illustrates  a  principle  which  it  is  important  for  men 
of  the  world  and  especially  politicians  to  bear  in  mind.  How  foolish, 
how  impolitic,  the  indiscriminate  abuse  of  political  opponents  whose 
humble  condition  or  insignificance  prevents  the  possibility  of  injury, 
and  who  may  be  greatly  benefited  by  the  notoriety  thus  acquired. 
I  firmly  believe  this  is  one  of  the  frequent  and  great  errors 
committed  by  the  political  editors  of  the  present  day.  Indeed,  I 
sincerely  doubt  whether  I  owe  most  to  the  kind  and  efficient  support 
of  my  friends,  and  no  man  similarly  situated  ever  had  better  and 
truer  friends,  or  to  the  violent,  reckless  and  imprudent  opposition 
of  my  enemies.  Certain  I  am  that  without  both  of  these  causes  united, 
I  never  could  have  succeeded  as  well  as  I  have  done.  But  I  must  for- 
bear ;  for  I  find  that  I  am  philosophizing,  which  is  far  from  my  pres- 
ent purpose. 


66 


During  the  summer  of  1834  my  time  was  about  equally  divided 
between  law  and  politics,  reading  and  practicing  the  one  and  preaching 
the  other.  There  was  a  general  election  pending  for  governor,  con- 
gressman, and  members  of  the  Legislature,  in  which  I  felt  no  ordinary 
interest  and  took  an  active  part.  I  supported  the  Democratic  candi- 
dates ;  William  Kinney  for  governor  against  Gen.  Joseph  Duncan,  and 
Wm.  L.  May  for  Congress  against  Benjamin  Mills,  and  the  Demo- 
cratic ticket  for  the  Legislature  in  my  own  county.  We  lost  our  gov- 
ernor ;  elected  our  congressman ;  and  a  part  of  our  legislative  ticket. 

At  this  time  John  J.  Hardin,  Esq.,  (now  Gen.  Hardin)  held  the 
office  of  state's  attorney,  under  an  appointment  from  Governor  Rey- 
nolds, which  then  had  two  years  to  run.  He  had  procured  this  ap- 
pointment through  the  aid  and  influence  of  Col.  James  Evans,  Col. 
William  Weatherford,  Capt.  John  Wyatt  and  other  leading  Democrats, 
every  one  of  whom  he  opposed  at  the  next  election  after  the  appoint- 
ment. Capt.  Wyatt  was  the  only  one  of  them  who  succeeded  in  his 
election,  and  was  so  indignant  at  Hardin  for  what  he  called  his  in- 
gratitude, that  he  determined  upon  removing  him  from  office  at  all 
hazards.  The  opposition  having  succeeded  in  electing  their  gov- 
ernor, there  was  no  hope  from  that  quarter;  and  the  only  resort  left 
was  to  repeal  the  law  conferring  the  appointment  upon  the  governor, 
and  make  the  office  elective  by  the  Legislature.  At  the  request  of 
Capt.  Wyatt,  I  wrote  the  bill,  and  on  the  second  day  of  the  session  of 
the  Legislature  which  commenced  on  the  first  Monday  in  December, 
1864,  he  introduced  his  bill,  and  also  another  bill  written  by  myself 
making  the  county  recorder's  election  by  the  people,  instead  of  being 
appointed  by  the  governor.  I  felt  no  peculiar  interest  in  these  bills 
any  further  than  I  thought  them  correct  in  principle,  and  desired  to  see 
them  pass  because  my  friends  warmly  supported  them.  Both  the 
bills  were  violently  opposed  by  the  opposition  (alias  Federal  party) 
and  advocated  by  a  large  majority  of  the  Democrats,  and  finally  passed 
by  a  small  majority.  When  sent  to  the  Council  of  Revision  (com- 
posed of  the  governor  and  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court)  for  approval, 
they  were  both  vetoed;  the  former  as  unconstitutional,  and  the  latter 
because  it  was  inexpedient.  Then  came  a  desperate  struggle  between 
the  friends  and  opponents  of  the  bills,  and  especially  the  state's  at- 
torney bill.  The  opposition  charged  that  its  only  object  was  to  repeal 

67 


Hardin  out  of  office  in  order  to  elect  myself  in  his  place,  and  that  the 
whole  movement  had  its  origin  in  Wyatt's  malice  and  my  selfishness 
and  ambition.  I  will  here  remark,  and  most  solemnly  aver  it  to  be  true, 
that  up  to  the  time  this  charge  was  made  against  me,  I  never  had  con- 
ceived the  idea  of  being  a  candidate  for  the  office,  nor  had  any  friend 
suggested  or  hinted  to  me  that  I  could  or  ought  to  receive  it.  But 
from  that  moment  forward,  the  friends  of  the  bill  declared  that,  in 
the  event  they  passed  the  bill  over  the  heads  of  the  council,  I  should 
be  elected  to  the  office.  At  this  time  I  did  not  desire  to  be  a  candi- 
date, for  I  had  no  reason  to  suppose  I  could  be  elected  over  so  formid- 
able an  opponent  who  had  been  a  long  time  a  resident  of  the  state, 
had  fought  in  the  Black  Hawk  war,  and  was  well  acquainted  with 
the  members.  My  short  residence  in  the  state,  want  of  acquaintance, 
experience  in  my  profession  and  age  (being  only  twenty-one  years 
old),  I  considered  insuperable  objections.  My  friends,  however, 
thought  differently,  passed  the  bill,  and  elected  me  on  the  first  ballot 
by  four  votes  majority. 

I  will  here  remark  that  although  I  wrote  this  bill  and  reaped  first 
fruits  under  it,  and  was  inclined  at  that  time  to  think  it  was  cor- 
rect in  principle  and  ought  to  become  a  law ;  yet  subsequent  experience, 
observation  and  reflection  have  convinced  me  of  my  error;  and  I  now 
believe  that  all  Legislative  elections  ought  to  be  abolished,  and  the 
officers  either  appointed  by  the  governor  and  senate,  or  elected  by  the 
people.  In  this  remark  I  do  not  mean  to  include  clerks  of  our  courts, 
whose  appointments,  I  am  inclined  to  think,  ought  to  be  vested  in  the 
judges. 

Immediately  upon  my  election  as  state's  attorney  I  procured  all 
the  standard  works  upon  criminal  law  within  my  reach,  such  as  Arch- 
bold,  Chitty,  Roscoe,  McNally,  Hale's  Pleas  of  the  Crown,  &c.,  &c., 
and  devoted  myself  to  the  study  of  them  with  a  determination  of 
making  myself  master  of  that  branch  of  my  profession.  My  official 
duties  being  exclusively  within  the  line  of  my  profession,  I  now  ap- 
plied myself  assiduously  to  study  and  practice.  How  far  I  succeeded 
in  this,  I  must  leave  to  others,  who  are  more  impartial  judges  than 
myself.  An  amusing  circumstance  occurred  in  McLean  county  at  the 
first  court  after  my  election  as  prosecuting  attorney.  The  grand  jury 
had  found  a  large  number  of  indictments  for  different  offences,  and 

68 


I  had  been  engaged  all  night  in  writing  them,  in  great  haste,  in  order 
to  discharge  the  grand  jury  and  enable  them  to  return  to  their  families. 
After  the  grand  jurors  were  discharged  John  T.  Stuart,  Esq.,  came 
into  court  and  moved  to  quash  all  the  indictments,  although  he  had 
been  employed  in  but  a  small  number  of  the  cases.  He  stated  his 
reasons  for  quashing  the  indictments,  which  were  that  they  were 
presented  by  the  "grand  jurors  in  and  for  the  county  of  McClean" 
when  in  fact  there  was  no  such  county  as  "McClean,"  the  true  name 
of  the  county  being  "McLean."  The  manner  of  making  this  motion 
was  very  pompous  and  accompanied  with  some  rather  contemptuous 
remarks  imputing  ignorance  to  the  writer  of  the  indictments.  Con- 
trasting my  youth  and  inexperience  with  the  long  practice  and  repu- 
tation of  the  opposing  counsel,  I  considered  his  conduct  extremely  un- 
generous, and  more  especially  in  a  county  where  he  was  well  ac- 
quainted with  the  people  and  I  was  an  entire  stranger.  The  moment 
the  motion  to  quash  was  made  and  the  objection  was  pointed  out,  it 
struck  my  mind  as  being  fatal  to  all  the  indictments,  and  had  it  been 
done  in  a  respectful  and  courteous  manner,  I  should  have  made  no 
objection  to  the  indictments  being  quashed.  When  the  judge  (Stephen 
T.  Logan)  asked  me  if  I  had  anything  to  say  in  support  of  the  indict- 
ments, I  told  him  I  did  not  consider  it  necessary  as  yet  to  say  any- 
thing, Mr.  Stuart  having  made  the  motion  and  having  the  affirma- 
tive of  the  question,  the  burden  of  proof  of  course  rested  upon  him. 
That  I  presumed  the  court  would  not  take  official  notice  that  I  had 
not  spelled  the  name  of  the  county  right  until  some  evidence  should 
be  produced,  it  would  then  be  time  enough  for  me  to  rebut  such  evi- 
dence. The  court  decided  that  it  could  not  officially  take  notice  of 
the  precise  mode  of  spelling  the  name  of  the  county,  and  gave  Mr. 
Stuart  time  to  procure  the  statute  creating  and  naming  the  county.  My 
object  was  now  accomplished;  knowing  there  was  none  of  the 
statutes  to  be  found  in  the  county,  and  that  it  would  require  a  good 
deal  of  traveling,  trouble  and  expense  to  procure  one,  which  would 
sufficiently  rebuke  the  gentleman's  insolence;  but  not  doubting  that 
when  the  statute  was  produced,  it  would  show  that  the  defect  in  the 
indictments  was  fatal  and  they  ought  to  be  quashed.  After  a  lapse 
of  two  days  the  statute  was  procured  from  an  adjoining  county,  and 
read  to  the  court  by  Mr.  Stuart,  when  to  his  astonishment,  and  I  will 

60 


say  to  the  astonishment  of  myself  and  the  whole  bar,  it  appeared  that 
the  name  of  the  county  in  the  indictment  was  right,  and  that  the 
learned  gentleman  did  not  know  how  to  spell  the  name  of  the  county 
he  had  practiced  in  for  years.  It  turned  the  joke  upon  him  so  com- 
pletely, and  excited  so  much  mirth  and  humor  at  his  expense,  that  he 
could  not  conceal  his  chagrin  and  mortification.  The  indictments  were 
all  sustained  by  the  court,  much  to  my  gratification.  Some  time  af- 
terwards I  took  the  pains  to  compare  this  printed  statute  with  the 
enrolled  bill  in  the  office  of  the  secretary  of  state,  and  found  there  was 
a  misprint,  the  true  name  of  the  county  being  McLean.  This  small 
incident,  although  of  no  consequence  of  itself,  has  been  an  instruc- 
tive lesson  to  me  in  the  practice  of  law  ever  since,  to  wit:  Admit 
nothing,  and  require  my  adversary  to  prove  everything  material  to  the 
success  of  his  cause.  Every  lawyer's  experience  teaches  him  that 
many  good  causes  are  saved  and  bad  ones  gained  by  a  strict  observance 
of  this  rule.  During  the  time  I  held  the  office  of  state's  attorney, 
I  conducted  many  important  criminal  prosecutions,  and  as  far  as  I 
have  been  able  to  learn,  acquitted  myself  in  a  manner  satisfactory  to 
my  friends  and  the  public  generally. 

In  August,  1836,  I  was  elected  to  the  Legislature  from  the  county 
of  Morgan.  The  contest  was  a  very  spirited  one,  conducted  almost 
solely  upon  national  politics  and  party  grounds.  Each  party  ran  a 
full  ticket  and  strived  to  elect  the  whole  ticket.  The  stump  speeches 
were  made,  principally  by  Gen.  John  J.  Hardin  on  behalf  of  the  Whig 
ticket,  and  by  myself  in  support  of  the  Democratic  ticket.  The  con- 
test resulted  in  the  election  of  five  Democrats  and  one  Whig 
(Gen.  Hardin). 

NOTE.  The  original  of  the  above  sketch  of  Senator  Stephen 
A.  Douglas,  of  Illinois,  is  in  a  small  blank  book  found  among  his 
private  papers.  It  is  in  his  own  handwriting,  hastily  written  and 
evidently  never  revised  or  continued.  It  is  dated  September  1st,  1838, 
when  he  was  only  twenty-five  years  of  age,  and  does  not  extend  beyond 
his  service  in  the  Legislature.  It  was  evidently  never  intended  for 
publication  but  may  now  have  some  public  interest  as  the  candid 
statement  of  the  boyhood  and  early  manhood  of  a  young  man  who 
had  bravely  and  successfully  faced  life's  battle;  and  who  was  writing 
frankly  purely  for  his  own  future  information,  and  at  a  time  when 

70 


the  circumstances  were  yet  fresh  in  his  mind.  Autobiographies  are 
generally  carefully  written  in  old  age  when  the  circumstances  of  early 
youth  have  grown  dim,  and  perhaps  unconsciously  colored  by  the 
struggles  and  experiences  of  after  life. 

ROBERT  M.  DOUGLAS. 
March  5,  1909. 

ESTIMATES  OF  DOUGLAS,  FROM  AUTHORS  AND 

ORATORS. 

To  gain  an  adequate  appreciation  of  the  estimation  in  which 
Douglas  was  held  by  authors  and  statesmen,  who  were  his  contem- 
poraries and  personally  acquainted  with  him,  or  of  a  later  generation 
who  have  made  a  special  study  of  his  career,  it  is  necessary  to  read 
many  books.  We  give  below  some  brief  quotations,  which  will  show 
what  those  best  qualified  to  judge  thought  of  him.  They  are  from 
men  of  all  shades  of  political  opinion,  except  the  southern  slaveholding 
class.  The  first  ten  are  from  addresses  delivered  in  the  U.  S.  Senate 
and  House  of  Representatives  soon  after  his  death : 

The  sublime  spectacle  of  twenty  million  people  rising  as  one  man 
in  vindication  of  constitutional  liberty  and  free  government,  when 
assailed  by  misguided  rebels  and  plotting  traitors,  is  to  a  considerable 
extent  due  to  his  efforts.  His  magnanimous  and  patriotic  course  in 
this  trying  hour  of  his  country's  destiny  was  the  crowning  act  of  his 
life. — Lyman  Trumbull,  Senator  from  Illinois. 

In  my  judgment,  he  was  in  his  time  the  greatest  living  master  of 
forensic  discourse — Senator  McDougall,  of  California. 

By  his  voluntary  acts  he  furnished  the  strongest  possible  evidence 
that  with  him  the  preservation  of  the  Union  and  the  Constitution  were 
paramount  to  all  other  considerations. — Senator  Nesmith,  of  Oregon. 

I  would  be  unjust  to  my  feelings  should  I  fail  to  declare  how 
deep  and  sincere  was  my  sorrow  for  the  loss  of  this  distinguished 
Senator,  and  especially  at  a  time  when  he  had  the  power,  to  a  greater 
extent  than  any  other  living  man,  to  render  valuable  and  important 
services  to  our  perplexed  and  imperiled  country,  and  the  temper  and 
disposition  of  mind  to  use  that  power  as  it  should  have  been  used  by 
a  patriot  and  statesman. — Senator  Browning,  of  Illinois. 

He  was  a  party  man,  but  he  loved  his  country  better  than  his 
party. — Senator  Anthony,  of  Rhode  Island. 

71 


Dying  at  an  age  where  the  usefulness  of  statesmen  usually  begins, 
he  leaves  a  fame  that  will  outlive  eulogies  and  survive  monuments. — 
Representative  Richardson,  of  Illinois. 

As  an  extempore  speaker,  his  capabilities  were  transcendent  and 
amazing,  and  unquestionably  place  him  in  the  first  rank  of  debaters  of 
any  age  or  country. — Representative  McClernand,  of  Illinois. 

In  all  my  intercourse  of  an  intimate  character  with  him,  I  found 
him  to  be  an  honorable  and  patriotic  man,  disinterested  and  noble  in 
his  patriotism,  and  ready  to  sacrifice  his  personal  interests  for  the 
good  of  his  country. — Representative  Crittenden,  of  Kentucky. 

Oh  for  a  Clay,  a  Webster,  a  Douglas,  in  this  great  ordeal  of  con- 
stitutional freedom!  While  the  country  is  entangled  by  these  ser- 
pents of  revolution,  we  shall  miss  the  giant, — the  Hercules  of  the 
West — whose  limbs  had  grown  sinewy  in  strangling  the  poisonous 
brood. — Representative  S.  S.  Cox,  of  Ohio. 

Above  and  beyond  all  his  other  great  qualities,  his  love  of  country, 
his  devotion  to  the  Constitution,  to  the  Union,  to  the  glorious  flag 
which  is  its  emblem,  were  the  most  prominent  traits  of  Senator 
Douglas's  character. — Representative  Law,  of  Indiana. 

When  war  grew  out  of  the  conflicting  pretensions  of  the  Union 
and  the  Confederacy,  he  took  nobly  and  heartily  the  side  of  his  whole 
country. — Horace  Greeley:  The  American  Conflict. 

In  the  course  he  pursued  and  still  purposed  to  pursue,  he  was 

unquestionably  actuated  by  patriotic  motives His   was  the 

patriotic  course,  and  he  exhibited  his  earnest  purpose  to  preserve  the 
unity  and  life  of  the  nation. — Henry  Wilson:  The  Rise  and  Fall  of 
the  Slave  Power  in  America. 

His  last  words  to  the  public  have  a  breadth  of  patriotism  worthy 
of  the  noblest  statesmanship. — William  Henry  Smith:  A  Political 
History  of  Slavery. 

From  the  death  of  Clay  till  the  presidential  election  of  1860  the 
most  resonant  voice  of  them  all  was  the  voice  of  Stephen  Arnold 
Douglas.  It  is  scarcely  too  much  to  say  that  during  the  whole  period 
the  centre  of  the  stage  was  his,  and  his  the  most  stirring  part. — 
William  Garrott  Brown :  Stephen  Arnold  Douglas. 

While  Lincoln  lost  a  valuable  coadjutor  and  the  country  an 
important  factor  in  the  work  of  sustaining  national  unity,  the  Demo- 
cratic organization,  thoroughly  broken  as  it  was  by  the  war,  was 
deprived  of  the  man  who  above  all  others  would  have  been  competent 
and  courageous  in  bringing  about  its  re-establishment.  It  is  probable 
that,  had  he  lived,  Douglas's  career  would  have  been  as  significant  in 

72 


later  American  history  as  it  was  in  the  critical  decade  of  1850-1860. — 
Henry  Parker  Willis:     Stephen  A.  Douglas. 

Great  as  is  the  fame  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  it  may  be  doubted  whether 
his  name  would  ever  have  been  known  to  any  considerable  degree 
beyond  the  limits  of  the  State  of  Illinois,  but  for  his  proving  himself 
to  be  able  to  meet  and  successfully  cope  with  the  Senator  in  what 
are  known  as  the  Lincoln-Douglas  debates,  and  it  may  be  doubted 
whether  President  Lincoln  could  have  been  successful  in  the  mighty 
work  of  maintaining  the  integrity  of  the  Nation  but  for  the  timely 
support  of  Senator  Douglas. — Clark  E.  Carr:  Stephen  A.  Douglas, 
His  Life,  Public  Services,  &c. 

In  all  his  long  Congressional  career  there  is  nothing  that  re- 
dounds more  to  Douglas's  everlasting  credit  than  his  willingness  to 
defend  the  policy  of  his  successful  rival,  while  men  of  Lincoln's  own 
party  were  doubting 

No  one,  it  may  be  safely  affirmed,  could  have  so  steeled  the 
hearts  of  men  in  southern  Illinois  for  the  death  grapple 

The  greatest  of  War  Democrats 

Had  he  but  lived  to  temper  justice  with  mercy,  what  a  power  for 
good  might  he  not  have  been  in  the  days  of  reconstruction. — Allen 
Johnson:  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  a  Study  in  American  Politics. 

Mr.  Douglas  had  wished  to  be  President,  but  was  much  more 
powerful  in  his  real  place  of  leadership  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate. 


Mr.  Douglas,  no  mere  partisan,  after  all,  but  a  man  stedfast  in 
the  principles  upon  which  he  had  professed  to  act. — Woodrow  Wilson ; 
History  of  the  American  People. 

It  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  of  those  speeches*  that  they  were 
decisive  of  a  unified  North  in  the  "impending  conflict,"  and  that  they 
constituted  beyond  comparison  the  greatest  individual  service  rendered 
to  the  Union  by  any  public  man,  not  even  excepting  Mr.  Lincoln's, 
in  the  crucial  days  following  the  attack  on  Fort  Sumter.  In  their 
far-reaching  results  they  have  rarely  been  equalled  and  never  sur- 
passed by  any  forensic  effort  of  ancient  or  modern  times. — James 
Harrison  Wilson :  Under  the  Old  Flag. 

Without  the  aid  of  Douglas,  the  "Crime  against  Kansas,"  so 
eloquently  depicted  by  Mr.  Sumner,  would  have  been  complete.  With 
his  aid  it  was  prevented 

With  danger  to  the  Union  his  early  affections  and  the  associa- 
tions of  his  young  life  had  come  back.  He  remembered  that  he  was 
a  native  of  New  England,  that  he  had  been  reared  in  New  York,  that 

*At  Springfield,  111.,  April  25,  1861,  and  at  Chicago,  in  June  following. 

78 


he  had  been  crowned  with  honors  by  the  generous  and  confiding 
people  of  Illinois.  He  believed  in  the  Union  of  the  States,  and  he 
stood  by  his  country  with  a  fervor  and  energy  of  patriotism  which 
enshrined  his  name  in  the  history  and  in  the  hearts  of  the  American 
people.  His  death  created  the  profoundest  impression  in  the  country, 
and  the  Administration  felt  that  one  of  the  mighty  props  of  the  Union 
had  been  torn  away. — James  G.  Elaine:  Twenty  Years  of  Congress. 


Many  other  quotations  similar  to  the  above  might  be  printed  here, 
but  enough  has  been  given  to  accomplish  our  object.  We  subjoin 
one  more,  which  gives  a  view  of  his  personality  by  a  writer  who  was 
well  acquainted  with  him. 

He  had  a  full  and  rich  voice,  was  fluent  in  speech,  but  spoke  with 
deliberation  and  perfect  distinctness  of  enunciation,  and  was  thor- 
oughly self-possessed.  He  was  short  in  stature,  but  he  was  broad- 
shouldered  and  deep-chested,  and  had  a  large  and  finely  developed 
head.  I  used  to  think  that  his  head,  though  smaller  than  Webster's 
was  modelled  after  the  same  pattern. 

Mr.  Douglas's  manner,  though  easy  and  utterly  unconstrained, 
was  dignified  and  urbane.  Sometimes,  when  he  was  speaking  with 
animation,  he  had  a  good  natured,  earnest,  lionlike  look,  blended  with 
the  utmost  simplicity  and  illuminated  with  a  high  degree  of  intelligence. 
On  such  an  occasion,  I  doubt  if  a  stranger,  who  heard  him  for  the 
first  time  and  did  not  even  know  his  name,  could  have  listened  to  him 
ten  minutes  without  being  strongly  attracted  by  his  engaging  manner, 
nor  without  at  least  beginning  to  feel  a  personal  regard  for  him. 
He  was  still  more  winning  in  private  intercourse.  There  was  not  the 
least  taint  of  snobbishness  about  him ;  he  was  utterly  devoid  of  preten- 
tiousness. He  never  put  on  what  vain  and  self-conscious  Senators 
imagine  to  be  airs  of  Senatorial  dignity.  His  dignity  was  of  that 
solid,  genuine,  American  sort  which  can  unconsciously  take  care  of 
itself  without  airs  of  any  kind. — Oliver  Duer :  Great  Senators  of  the 
United  States. 


Mr.  Douglas  today,  in  a  clear,  emphatic,  and,  I  fear,  prophetic 
voice,  painted  the  horrors  of  a  war  we  are  bringing  on  ourselves, 
and  was  equally  severe  on  the  radicals  of  both  sides.  There  is  some- 
thing very  impressive  about  him,  and  I  felt  as  if  I  were  listening  to 
the  plain,  unvarnished  truth.  Mrs.  Douglas  was  in  the  gallery  of 
the  Senate  looking  the  pride  and  confidence  she  felt  in  her  husband's 
talents,  though  there  is  a  modesty  in  her  manner  in  charming  contrast 
with  her  truly  magnificent  appearance. — Diary  of  Mrs.  Eugene 
McLean,  in  Harper's  Magazine  for  January,  1914. 

74 


STEPHEN   A.    DOUGLAS. 


A  FEW  WORDS  IN  CONCLUSION. 

Stephen  A.  Douglas  was  one  of  the  greatest  men  of  his  time  in 
the  United  States,  and  in  some  respects  the  greatest.  As  a  Democratic 
statesman  and  leader  he  was  without  a  rival. 

The  great  issue  in  the  years  when  Douglas  flourished  was  the 
slavery  question.  All  others  paled  into  insignificance  before  it.  On 
this  question  he  was  not  a  dodger  or  trimmer.  He  took  his  position 
and  maintained  it  bravely  and  consistently  to  the  end.  What  that 
position  was  may  best  be  known  from  his  own  statement  of  it,  as  it 
appears  in  his  suggested  editorial  for  the  Illinois  State  Register,  as 
printed  for  the  first  time  in  his  own  words  in  this  volume,  and  as  he 
put  it  in  the  first  of  the  debates  with  Lincoln  at  Ottawa,  111.,  August 
21,  1858: 

I  do  not  hold  that  because  the  negro  is  our  inferior,  therefore  he 
ought  to  be  a  slave.  On  the  contrary,  I  hold  that  humanity  and 
Christianity  both  require  that  the  negro  shall  have  and  enjoy  every 
right,  every  privilege  and  every  immunity  consistent  with  the  safety 
of  the  society  in  which  he  lives.  You  and  I  are  bound  to  extend  to 
our  inferior  and  dependent  beings  every  right,  every  privilege,  every 
facility  and  immunity  consistent  with  the  public  good.  The  question 
then  arises,  What  rights  and  privileges  are  consistent  with  the  public 
good?  That  is  a  question  which  each  State  and  each  Territory  must 
decide  for  itself. 

This  was  known  as  the  doctrine  of  popular  sovereignty,  and  cer- 
tainly appeared  fair  and  reasonable  if  one  did  not  go  far  below  the 
surface  in  his  consideration  of  the  problem.  He  adhered  to  it  in  the 
matter  of  the  so-called  Lecompton  constitution  of  Kansas,  when  he 
knew  that  the  certain  result  of  his  stand  would  be  the  embitterment 
of  the  South  against  him,  and  the  loss  of  all  political  support  from 
that  section.  The  Lecompton  constitution  provided  for  the  protec- 
tion of  slavery  in  Kansas,  and  was  adopted  fraudulently  and  con- 
trary to  the  wishes  of  a  large  majority  of  the  voters  of  that  territory. 
For  that  reason  Douglas  opposed  its  ratification  by  Congress,  though, 
as  he  stated,  he  cared  nothing  whether  slavery  was  established  there 
or  not,  so  long  as  the  matter  was  settled  in  accordance  with  the  views 
of  a  majority  of  the  voters  there. 

Douglas's  great  error  lay  in  his  failure  to  realize  that  slavery 
was  fundamentally  wrong,  and  could  not  be  permitted  to  exist  in 

75 


any  state  or  territory,  notwithstanding  that  a  majority  of  its  citizens 
might  favor  it,  any  more  than  polygamy,  arson  or  assassination  could 
be  recognized  as  an  established  legal  institution  in  any  state. 

The  name  of  Douglas  is  probably  associated  in  the  minds  of  most 
people  today  with  the  great  Lincoln-Douglas  debates  in  Illinois  in 
1858,  when  Stephen  A.  Douglas  and  Abraham  Lincoln  appeared  before 
the  people  as  rival  candidates  for  the  United  States  Senatorship. 
While  the  subsequent  renown  of  Lincoln  became  so  great  as  to  over- 
shadow that  of  Douglas,  so  that  Lincoln  may  now  appear  to  be  the 
central  figure  of  those  debates,  it  should  not  be  forgotten  that  at  the 
time  they  occurred  Douglas  was  a  man  of  national  reputation,  while 
Lincoln  was  hardly  known  outside  the  borders  of  his  state.  He  ac- 
quired fame  by  his  ability  to  hold  his  own  with  such  a  master  of 
political  debate  as  Douglas. 

The  crowning  glory  of  Douglas's  career  came  after  his  defeat 
for  the  presidency  in  1860,  followed  by  the  attack  on  Fort  Sumter. 
His  attitude  then  was  noble  and  patriotic  in  the  highest  degree.  He 
exerted  his  influence  on  the  side  of  the  Union  and  against  rebellion 
and  secession,  without  hesitation  and  without  reserve.  He  upheld  the 
hands  of  the  President  in  his  efforts  to  suppress  the  rebellion  till  his 
untimely  death,  and  had  he  lived  would  undoubtedly  have  been  one  of 
the  strongest  bulwarks  of  the  administration.  Douglas's  decided 
stand  settled  the  question  of  the  attitude  of  the  great  mass  of  the 
northern  Democrats.  His  more  than  1,300,000  devoted  followers 
rallied  to  the  support  of  the  administration  and  the  defense  of  the 
Union.  What  would  have  been  the  final  outcome  if  Douglas  had 
favored  the  South  or  had  been  lukewarm  in  his  stand  for  the  Union, 
can  only  be  conjectured.  But  there  is  no  question  that  the  result 
would  have  been  disastrous. 

What  would  have  happened  if  Douglas  had  lived  to  the  close  of 
the  war  ?  This  question,  of  course,  cannot  be  answered  with  certainty. 
But  it  is  not  improbable  that  had  Douglas  been  elected  President  and 
lived,  there  would  have  been  no  war.  He  would  have  been  more  or 
less  acceptable  to  both  sides  and  all  factions,  and  might  have  had 
influence  enough  with  both  to  bring  about  an  adjustment  of  the  ques- 
tions in  dispute  without  a  resort  to  arms.  Had  he  lived  after  his 
defeat,  there  is  no  doubt  that  he  would  have  held  a  high  position  in  the 

76 


councils  of  the  administration.  John  W.  Forney,  an  intimate  friend 
of  Douglas,  in  his  Anecdotes  of  Public  Men,  states  "by  authority,"  that 
had  he  lived  he  would  have  been  called  into  the  administration  of 
President  Lincoln,  or  placed  in  one  of  the  highest  military  com- 
mands. And  it  is  surely  reasonable  to  conclude  that  when  the  Re- 
publicans were  casting  about  for  a  war  Democrat  to  take  the  vice- 
presidential  nomination  in  1864,  this  "greatest  of  war  Democrats" 
would  have  been  their  choice,  and  that  on  President  Lincoln's  death 
he,  instead  of  Andrew  Johnson,  would  have  become  President,  and 
thus  realized  his  long  cherished  ambition. 


77 


APPENDIX 


SPEECH  OF  HONORABLE  FRANK  L.  FISH 

SUPERIOR  JUDGE  OF  VERMONT 
ON  THE  LIFE  OF  STEPHEN  A.  DOUGLAS 


ADDRESS  OF  HON.  F.  L.  FISH  DELIVERED  BEFORE  THE 
STUDENTS  OF  NORWICH  UNIVERSITY  AT  NORTH- 
FIELD,  APRIL  23,  1913. 

Six  years  ago  I  spoke  to  the  students  of  Norwich  University  on 
Abraham  Lincoln,  a  Study  in  History.  Tonight  I  have  come  to  speak 
on  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  the  Other  Study.  It  is  probably  fortunate 
for  me  that  the  young  men  whom  I  then  addressed  have  gone  out  to 
meet  that  measure  of  success  that  so  justly  falls  to  the  lot  of  the 
graduates  of  this  institution  and  are  not  now  within  the  sound  of  my 
voice.  To  the  few  who  then  heard  me,  who  are  now  present,  I  beg 
to  make  a  retraction.  On  the  occasion  referred  to,  it  seemed  to  me  that 
for  the  sake  of  gaining  the  presidency  Douglas  had  compromised  him- 
self on  the  subject  of  slavery  and  had  been  inconsistent  in  his  political 
career.  To  such  thought  I  then  gave  utterance.  After  a  careful  study 
and  more  impartial  inquiry  I  ask  permission  to  revise  the  former 
judgment.  Although  it  must  be  confessed  that  he  was  wrong  in  his 
theory  of  the  solution  of  the  perplexed  question  of  slavery  legislation, 
he  ought  to  be  credited  with  being  honest  with  this  important  question, 
and  he  was  not  more  inconsistent  than  have  been  many  of  the  great 
statesmen  of  the  English-speaking  race  on  this  and  the  other  side 
of  the  Atlantic. 

One  hundred  years  ago  today  in  a  little  story-and-a-half  house, 
still  standing  in  the  Village  of  Brandon,  Stephen  A.  Douglas  was  born. 
Fifty-two  years  ago  this  month  he  made  his  last  speech  for  the  sup- 
pression of  the  Rebellion  and  the  integrity  of  the  Union.  Fifty-two 
years  ago  the  coming  June  he  passed  away.  Young  as  he  was,  for 
more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century  he  had  been  in  public  life.  During 
the  decade  from  1850  to  1860  he  was  the  most  conspicuous  leader  of 
the  Democratic  party.  After  the  passing  of  Webster  and  Clay  in  the 
early  fifties  he  was  the  greatest  debater  in  the  national  forum. 
Viewed  from  the  standpoint  of  political  activities,  of  forensic  powers 
and  accomplishments  and  of  capacity  for  leadership,  he  was  the  most 
remarkable  man  that  Vermont  ever  produced.  Douglas  died  at  a 
time  when  his  country  most  needed  his  patriotic  services.  Had  he 
lived  to  the  close  of  the  struggle  that  he  saw  the  beginning  of,  his 
name  would  have  been  given  a  shining  page  on  the  nation's  history. 

so 


The  Reaper  came  too  soon.  Before  the  onward  march  of  the  great 
character  who  was  his  successful  rival  half  a  century  ago  his  name 
and  fame  were  soon  forgotten,  and  he  is  now  recalled  because  of 
Lincoln's  relation  to  the  joint  debates.  It  was  Douglas's  name  then 
that  gave  the  debates  a  national  significance  and  impressed  the  name 
of  Lincoln  upon  the  popular  mind.  The  state  of  his  birth  is  ignorant 
of  his  career  and  one  who  would  discuss  intelligently  his  remarkable 
life  must  recount  the  incidents  of  his  rise  to  national  prominence, 
before  indulging  in  eulogy.  Fortunate  it  is  that  the  same  years  which 
have  brought  oblivion  to  his  name  have  produced  a  generation  of  men 
who  can  look  without  prejudice  upon  the  great  man  whose  measures 
for  the  settlement  of  the  slavery  question  did  not  meet  with  the 
favor  of  our  fathers.  To  view  Douglas  fairly  from  the  present  point 
of  time  he  must  be  considered  in  the  light  of  the  age  in  which  he  lived ; 
he  should  be  viewed  from  the  broad  standpoint  of  a  New  England 
boyhood,  a  young  manhood  passed  on  the  prairies  of  Illinois,  and  a 
wedded  life  pervaded  by  the  gentle  culture  of  Southern  womanhood. 

Who  was  Stephen  A.  Douglas  ?  He  was  a  descendant  of  William 
Douglas,  who  was  the  first  of  the  family  by  that  name  to  cross  the 
ocean  from  Scotland  to  America.  In  1645  a  son  was  born  to  William 
Douglas  in  Boston,  from  whom  descended  in  1750  Benajah  Douglas, 
the  grandfather  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  who  settled  in  Rensselaer 
County,  New  York.  Benajah  married  Martha  Arnold,  a  descendent 
of  Governor  William  Arnold  of  Rhode  Island,  whom  tradition  says 
was  a  soldier  in  the  Revolutionary  army.  Benajah  moved  to  Brandon, 
Vermont,  and  purchased  a  four  hundred  acre  farm  where  he  resided 
until  his  death.  In  physical  appearance  Stephen  A.  Douglas  resembled 
his  grandfather.  Five  times  he  was  elected  a  selectman  of  Brandon 
and  as  many  times  honored  by  an  election  to  the  Legislature. 

The  outline  of  Dr.  Stephen  A.  Douglas  is  far  less  distinct  than 
that  of  his  father,  but  it  appears  that  he  was  born  at  Stephentown, 
Rensselaer  County,  New  York,  where  he  spent  no  more  than  his  boy- 
hood. He  married  Sally  Fisk  of  Brandon,  the  daughter  of  a  well-to- 
do  farmer,  of  which  marriage  were  born  a  son  and  a  daughter.  Doctor 
Douglas  was  a  physician  of  skill  and  promise,  but  his  career  was  cut 
short  by  a  sudden  stroke  which  overcame  him  as  he  held  his  infant  son, 
Stephen  A.,  in  his  arms. 

81 


Following  the  death  of  her  husband,  Douglas's  mother  took  him 
with  his  sister  to  the  farm  in  Brandon  which  she  and  her  brother 
had  inherited  from  their  father,  and  here  she  and  the  children  resided 
for  fourteen  years,  until  the  marriage  of  the  brother  and  the  birth 
of  a  son,  whose  claims  upon  the  father  prompted  the  latter  to  renounce 
his  intention  to  give  his  nephew  a  college  education.  Bitterly  dis- 
appointed over  this,  Douglas  at  once  left  his  uncle's  roof,  walked 
fifteen  miles  to  Middlebury  and  secured  employment  as  a  cabinet 
maker  in  the  shop  of  Nahum  Parker,  where  he  remained  for  a  year. 
At  the  end  of  this  time  he  abandoned  Middlebury  and  entered  the 
shop  of  Deacon  Caleb  Knowlton  at  Brandon.  At  the  end  of  another 
year  ill  health  compelled  him  to  abandon  this  kind  of  employment. 
Then  followed  his  enrollment  as  a  student  at  Brandon  Academy,  his 
avowed  purpose  being  to  prepare  for  a  profession.  He  remained  a 
student  at  this  institution  for  about  a  year. 

Wedding  bells  rang  in  another  change  in  Douglas's  fortunes. 
This  time  his  sister  married  and  moved  to  Ontario  County,  New 
York.  Their  mother,  who  married  the  father  of  her  daughter's  hus- 
band, Gehazi  Granger,  soon  followed.  Thither  Douglas  went,  resum- 
ing his  studies  at  the  Canandaigua  Academy.  He  was  now  seventeen 
years  old  and  showed  proficiency  in  Latin  and  Greek,  took  a  prominent 
part  in  literary  societies  and  distinguished  himself  in  debate.  Here 
he  became  an  ardent  defender  of  Democracy,  an  apt  pupil  in  practical 
politics.  His  lively  inquisitiveness  marked  him  from  his  comrades. 
His  remarkable  talents  were  displayed  in  a  capacity  to  acquire  learning 
by  indirection  as  much  as  from  the  books.  It  was  apparent,  too, 
that  he  had  forensic  gifts  that  were  exceptional. 

In  the  spring  of  1833,  when  he  was  twenty  years  old,  against  the 
remonstrance  of  his  mother  and  other  relatives,  he  started  for  the 
West,  stopping  first  at  Cleveland,  where  he  suffered  a  long  illness 
which  prevented  his  entering  the  law  office  of  Sherlock  J.  Andrews, 
Esq.,  who  offered  to  take  him  as  a  student.  The  entreaties  of  friends 
could  not  persuade  him,  although  broken  with  sickness,  to  return  to 
the  East.  He  had  set  his  face  westward  and  thither  his  destiny  had 
decreed  he  should  go.  With  but  forty  dollars  left  he  began  the  jour- 
ney, visiting  Cincinnati,  Louisville  and  St.  Louis,  and  at  last  arriving 
at  Jacksonville,  Morgan  County,  Illinois,  with  but  thirty-seven  cents 

82 


in  his  pocket,  and  nothing  save  his  talent  and  ambition  with  which  to 
begin  life  in  the  great  West. 

Finding  no  employment  at  Jacksonville,  he  walked  ten  miles  to 
Winchester,  where  he  secured  employment  for  three  days  as  an 
auctioneer's  clerk  and  earned  six  dollars.  Through  the  assistance  of 
a  Vermonter,  who  was  a  storekeeper  at  Winchester,  he  obtained  forty 
pupils,  whom  he  taught  for  a  term  of  three  months,  and  earned  funds 
with  which  to  return  to  Jacksonville  and  establish  himself  in  his 
profession.  He  read  law,  debated  in  lyceums  and  proved  himself 
astonishingly  well  informed. 

In  March,  1833,  although  not  yet  twenty-one  years  of  age,  he 
was  admitted  to  the  bar.  Jacksonville  was  the  county  seat,  the  gather- 
ing place  for  country  folk,  a  center  of  the  political  life  of  the  com- 
munity. Here  came  to  Douglas  his  first  opportunity.  It  was  of  a 
political  character  and  afforded  an  exhibition  of  his  remarkable 
talents,  his  forensic  powers  and  exact  and  definite  knowledge  of  the 
history  of  his  own  country.  From  his  early  boyhood  he  had  been  an 
admirer  of  Andrew  Jackson,  and  this  admiration  amounted  to  hero- 
worship.  He  had  assisted  at  Brandon,  as  a  boy,  in  tearing  down 
the  coffin  handbills  which  were  posted  by  Jackson's  political  opponents. 
Jackson  embodied  his  highest  ideal  of  a  man,  a  general  and  a  states- 
man. He  was  to  Douglas  the  perfect  representative  of  the  Democratic 
party,  with  which  he  formed  an  early  alliance  and  to  which  he  clung 
throughout  his  life  with  a  tenacity  and  love  that  at  no  time  abated. 
In  Jackson  all  the  glories  and  virtues  of  the  party  were  embodied  and 
individualized. 

Just  before  Douglas  was  admitted  to  the  bar  Jackson  had  declared 
against  the  National  Bank  and  withdrawn  the  government  deposits. 
This  act  aroused  his  political  opponents  and  brought  consternation  to 
the  men  of  his  own  party.  A  mass  meeting  of  all  good  Democrats  was 
called  at  Jacksonville  to  take  action  on  the  question.  Should  they 
support  or  resist  the  administration?  Resolutions  had  been  prepared 
in  endorsement  of  the  President's  course  and  these  had  been  committed 
to  a  party  leader  of  experience  and  ability  to  submit  to  the  meeting. 
At  the  last  moment,  however,  he  demurred  and  to  Douglas  fell  the 
task  as  well  as  the  opportunity  to  introduce  the  measure.  He  pre- 
sented the  resolutions  and  retired  to  hear  the  discussion.  The  leading 

83 


opponent  was  a  well  known  politician,  of  long  acquaintance  and  high 
standing  in  Jacksonville.  When  he  had  finished,  Douglas  in  an 
elaborate  and  convincing  argument,  eloquently  expressed  and  embrac- 
ing all  the  knowledge  which  the  question  involved,  had  vanquished  his 
opponent.  So  complete  indeed  was  his  victory  that  his  antagonist  left 
the  hall  before  the  speech  was  finished.  The  audience  was  carried  by 
storm.  In  the  demonstration  that  followed  Douglas  was  borne  from 
the  meeting  on  the  shoulders  of  his  enthusiastic  admirers.  Years  after- 
wards men  in  Jacksonville  declared  this  was  the  greatest  speech  they 
had  ever  heard.  He  was  then  twenty-one.  This  triumph  gave  him 
the  name  of  The  Little  Giant. 

In  February,  1835,  while  still  in  his  twenty-first  year,  Douglas 
was  elected  by  the  Legislature  of  Illinois  state's  attorney  of  the  First 
Judicial  District,  over  the  able  and  experienced  lawyer,  John  J.  Hardin. 
A  stripling  of  diminutive  stature,  scarcely  five  feet  high,  weighing  less 
than  a  hundred  pounds,  this  little  man  rode  his  circuit  embracing  many 
of  the  large  counties  of  Illinois  and  found  favor  in  the  conduct  of  his 
first  public  office.  Not  one  of  his  indictments  was  quashed ;  his  frank- 
ness disarmed  ill-natured  opponents,  his  generosity  made  friends. 
The  members  of  the  bar,  at  first  skeptical  of  his  learning  and  ability, 
found  in  him  an  efficient  prosecutor  and  a  formidable  trial  lawyer. 

In  1836,  the  twenty-third  year  of  his  age,  he  was  foremost  in 
effecting  a  party  organization  in  Illinois,  the  first  to  organize  and  de- 
velop the  machinery  belonging  to  the  successful  administration  of  a 
great  party.  He  advocated  the  first  convention  to  choose  delegates  to 
national  conventions  as  well  as  county,  state  and  district.  The  same 
year  he  was  elected  to  the  Legislature  of  Illinois.  Here  he  came  in 
contact  with  a  remarkable  assembly  of  men,  which  afterwards  fur- 
nished Governors,  Congressmen  and  United  States  Senators  and  one 
President  of  the  United  States.  At  this  session  Douglas  displayed 
genius  for  legislation  which  later  made  him  celebrated  in  Congress. 
He  earnestly  advocated  the  completion  of  the  Illinois  and  Michigan 
canals  and  improvement  of  the  Illinois  and  Wabash  Rivers  by  the 
state.  He  pleaded  for  two  great  railroads  crossing  Illinois,  one  from 
east  to  west  and  one  from  north  to  south,  in  aid  of  which  he  would 
pledge  the  credit  of  the  state  and  meet  the  interest  by  sales  of  public 
lands.  As  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Petitions  he  reported  ad- 


versely  to  granting  divorces  by  legislative  acts  and  proposed  a  general 
measure  on  the  subject,  which  became  a  law. 

At  the  close  of  this  session — he  was  now  twenty- four — he  re- 
signed from  the  Legislature  and  was  appointed  by  the  President  of 
the  United  States,  to  the  office  of  Register  of  Public  Lands  at  Spring- 
field. The  following  year  he  resigned  this  office  to  accept  a  nomination 
to  Congress.  In  a  lengthy  canvass  for  this  place  he  displayed  excep- 
tional abilities  as  a  campaigner  and  organizer  throughout  the  thirty- 
four  counties  of  the  district.  In  the  consolidation  of  the  party  he 
rallied  to  his  standard  a  larger  following  than  his  most  ardent  sup- 
porters at  first  thought  possible,  but  was  unfortunate  in  being  pitted 
against  John  T.  Stewart,  a  man  of  established  reputation  and  marked 
ability,  who  prevailed  by  a  margin  of  less  than  fifty  votes. 

Douglas  now  directed  his  attention  to  the  law,  in  which  he 
achieved  success.  No  account  of  the  great  lawyers  of  Illinois  of  his 
time  omits  his  name  from  the  list.  He  was  a  skilful,  able  and  success- 
ful advocate  before  the  trial  courts  and  his  name  is  frequently  seen 
in  connection  with  important  cases  argued  before  the  Supreme  Court. 

In  1839,  when  he  was  twenty-six,  he  was  made  a  member  of  the 
Sangamon  County  delegation  to  the  State  Convention;  then  became 
chairman  of  the  State  Central  Committee,  and  later  manager  of  the 
Democratic  campaign  for  Illinois.  A  year  later  he  carried  Illinois  for 
Van  Buren  against  General  Harrison.  In  this  campaign  he  entered 
fearlessly  and  eloquently  into  joint  debates  with  men  of  national  repu- 
tation, Governors  and  ex-Governors  of  states,  who  were  brought  to 
Illinois  in  defence  of  the  Whig  candidate,  and  proved  himself  their 
superior  as  a  debater.  During  the  year  a  further  political  honor  came 
to  him, — the  appointment  of  Secretary  of  State  of  Illinois. 

When  he  was  twenty-eight  he  was  appointed  Judge  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  Illinois,  in  which  office  for  two  years  he  administered  justice 
impartially.  He  was  at  home  on  the  bench,  where  his  freedom  from 
affectation,  false  dignity,  his  fairness  and  good  nature  commended  him 
to  the  laity  and  the  bar  alike.  As  a  Judge  in  the  trial  courts  he  was 
described,  by  way  of  dispatching  business,  as  "a  perfect  steam  engine 
in  breeches."  His  decisions  were  rarely  overruled.  His  opinions, 
written  in  cases  heard  by  him  and  his  associates  on  questions  of  law 


while  sitting  as  the  Supreme  Court,  bear  the  stamp  of  excellent  lawyer- 
ship. 

In  1842,  when  he  was  twenty-nine,  he  was  one  of  the  leading 
candidates  before  the  Democratic  caucus  of  his  state  for  United  States 
Senator.  A  year  later  he  received  a  nomination  for  Congress.  In  the 
contest  that  followed,  during  which  he  addressed  his  constituents  for 
forty  successive  days  and  nights  on  the  issues  of  the  campaign,  he  won 
by  a  majority  of  four  hundred  votes.  We  now  see  him  about  to  be 
transplanted  from  the  narrow  field  of  his  past  political  activities  to 
the  broad  domain  of  national  legislation,  with  its  responsibilities  and 
possibilities.  In  the  two  departments  of  this  field  of  effort  and  honor 
he  is  destined  to  spend  his  remaining  years  of  service.  Here  he  is  to 
stand  in  the  front  rank  of  his  party,  on  the  firing  line  and  before  the 
public  gaze  for  eighteen  years,  and  for  a  portion  of  the  period  as  the 
most  conspicuous  American  in  public  life. 

It  is  but  ten  years  since  he  left  Canandaigua  for  some  place  in 
the  great  West,  he  knew  not  what  place,  there  to  carve  out  a  career. 
He  had  not  in  the  meantime  returned  to  the  East,  but  on  his  way  to 
Congress  he  visited  friends  at  Canandaigua.  What  American,  what 
Vermonter,  is  not  moved  by  feelings  of  emotion  and  pride  as  he 
follows  this  remarkable  man,  who  went  forth  unaided  and  alone,  with- 
out friends  or  fortune  or  fame  into  a  strange,  new  land,  and  in  ten 
years  came  home  to  lay  down  at  the  feet  of  his  proud  mother  such  a 
succession  of  offices  as  it  falls  to  the  lot  of  few  men  to  hold  through- 
out the  years  of  a  long  political  life:  State's  Attorney  of  a  great 
district  in  a  large  and  important  state,  Register  of  a  Federal  Land 
Office,  Secretary  of  State,  Judge  of  the  Supreme  Court,  and  now  a 
member  of  Congress.  Add  to  these,  if  you  please,  his  professional 
eminence  and  leadership  of  the  great  party  to  which  he  belonged  in 
the  state  of  his  adoption.  Has  Vermont  produced  another  who  has 
achieved  such  distinction  in  so  brief  a  time?  There  can  be  but  one 
answer.  If  the  inquiry  is  made  nation-wide  where  can  there  be 
found  a  parallel  to  this?  If  it  can  be  said  by  the  skeptically  inclined 
that  this  record  was  made  possible  only  by  shrewd  politics  on  the  part 
of  Douglas  and  fortune,  it  can  truthfully  be  declared  that  he  dis- 
charged all  these  important  trusts  ably,  honestly,  fearlessly,  and  in 


such  a  manner  that  each  new  duty  entrenched  him  the  more  firmly  in 
the  favor  of  his  constituents. 

Before  we  enter  with  him  the  halls  of  Congress  let  us  inquire 
more  carefully  about  him.  We  have  caught  but  glimpses  of  him  thus 
far  as  he  rushed  from  office  to  office,  resigning  one  to  accept  another, 
or  retiring  from  office  to  make  good  in  his  profession,  or  devoting 
his  energies  to  service,  in  behalf  of  party.  What  were  the  qualities 
that  singled  Douglas  out  from  other  remarkable  men  who  were  then 
in  Illinois,  a  state  then  abounding  in  great  men,  and  enabled  him  to 
outstrip  them  all  in  the  race  for  political  preferment?  Allow  me  to 
draw  a  picture  of  him  and  then  you  may  be  able  to  answer  my  ques- 
tion and  you  will  conclude,  I  am  sure,  that  it  was  a  combination  of 
exceptional  qualities  that  enabled  him  to  win.  His  personality  was 
winning,  his  temper  elastic,  his  spirit  fearless  and  ardent.  His  self 
confidence  was  unbounded.  He  possessed  a  surpassing  energy  of  in- 
tellect and  will.  The  intense  activity  of  his  mind  and  the  quickness 
of  its  working  made  him  a  formidable  debater.  The  resoluteness  and 
energy  with  which  he  embarked  in  any  cause  that  enlisted  his 
sympathies  and  support  carried  him  immediately  to  the  front.  His 
mind  was  fertile  in  resources.  He  was  a  master  of  logic.  It  must 
be  confessed,  too,  that  no  one  excelled  him  in  sophistry  and  fallacy. 
If  it  is  true  that  he  could  perceive  more  quickly  than  others  the 
strength  or  weakness  of  an  argument  and  could  elucidate  a  point  to 
his  advantage,  it  is  likewise  true  that  he  knew  the  art  of  beclouding 
it  for  his  opponent.  In  the  field  of  debate  which  resembled  physical 
combat  he  had  no  equal.  He  had  at  ready  command  on  all  occasions 
a  flow  of  terse,  vigorous  and  pointed  English,  which  gave  no  halting 
to  his  phrase.  His  words  went  straight  at  the  mark,  without  the 
adornment  of  rhetoric  or  the  aid  of  similes.  He  gathered  his  prece- 
dents from  the  history  of  his  own  country.  He  rarely  employed  a 
classical  allusion  and  never  quoted  a  line  of  poetry.  Within  the 
range  of  American  history  his  knowledge  was  comprehensive,  minute 
and  critical.  He  was  by  nature  an  orator.  He  could  lead  a  crowd, 
almost  irresistibly  to  his  own  conclusions.  He  could  have  fired  a 
mob  to  desperate  deeds.  He  was  a  born  leader  of  men.  He  had  faith 
in  his  own  fitness  for  leadership  and  dared  to  take  its  responsibilities. 
He  never  seems  to  have  agonized  over  the  choice  of  a  path.  He  was 

8T 


a  devout  believer  in  party  platforms  and  principles  and  party  organiza- 
tion. His  creed  embraced  the  principles  of  Jefferson  and  Jackson  and 
these  he  held  to  be  sufficient  for  the  problems  and  emergencies  of  his 
political  life.  As  a  lawyer  he  mastered  the  main  facts  of  his  cases 
with  the  utmost  facility  and  his  mind  went  at  once  to  the  points  that 
were  sure  to  affect  the  decision.  He  had  the  skill  and  temper  to 
manage  men,  knew  how  to  conciliate  opponents,  to  impress  the 
thoughtful,  and  to  manage  all  classes  of  people.  He  was  industrious 
and  energetic.  He  had  a  way  of  making  his  fellows  like  him.  Of 
their  own  accord  they  put  him  forward.  No  one  ever  entered  more 
readily  into  close  personal  relations  with  those  whom  he  encountered. 
His  maturity  and  easy  manners  were  intensified  by  the  smallness  of 
his  stature.  His  blue  eyes  and  dark  abundant  hair  heightened  his 
physical  charm  and  boyishness.  His  virility,  his  heavy-browed  face, 
round  and  strong,  and  his  finely  formed  and  uncommonly  large  head 
gave  him  an  appearance  of  intellectual  power.  His  voice  was  a  deep 
bass  and  had  a  great  carrying  power,  by  which  he  was  able  to  reach 
vast  multitudes.  Each  word  distinctly  uttered  was  projected  out  from 
his  deep  chest  as  if  fired  from  a  cannon. 

Such  was  Congressman-elect  Douglas  when  he  presented  him- 
self for  admission  to  the  Congress  of  1843.  Naturally  it  was  quite 
unaware  of  his  unusual  talents;  it  did  not  know  about  his  record  in 
Illinois  and  it  would  not  have  cared  had  it  known.  Local  records 
are  not  of  much  concern  in  Washington.  Records  have  to  be  made 
there  if  they  are  to  be  of  consequence,  and  few  there  are  who  are 
able  to  make  them.  President  Tyler  was  presiding  at  the  White 
House  and  General  Jackson,  though  still  alive,  had  retired  from  active 
politics  and  was  spending  his  last  days  at  the  Hermitage.  The  House 
was  considering  the  hackneyed  theme  of  remitting  the  fine  that  had 
been  imposed  upon  the  General  by  Judge  Hall  of  New  Orleans  for 
contempt  of  court  in  sending  the  Judge  out  of  the  city  to  a  point 
where  he  could  not  interfere  with  the  administration  of  martial  law  by 
the  use  of  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus  during  the  time  the  General 
was  in  command  of  the  city.  On  the  cessation  of  hostilities  and  the 
return  of  Judge  Hall  to  the  city  he  summoned  General  Jackson  before 
him  and  imposed  a  fine  of  one  thousand  dollars  for  contempt  in  his 
treatment  of  the  Judge  and  in  disregard  of  the  orders  of  his  court. 


This  was  promptly  paid.     Each  Congress  had  taken  up  the  subject 
of  remitting  the  fine,  had  argued  it  and  had  as  many  times  voted  it 
down.     The  usual  fate  apparently  awaited  the  measure  at  this  session 
for  no  very  good  reason  could  be  assigned  by  anybody,  as  it  seemed, 
why  the  fine  should  be  returned.     Jackson  was  again  Douglas's  oppor- 
tunity.    Now  was  the  time  to  strike  another  blow  for  his  hero.     Now 
was  the  time  to  rescue  his  idol  from  the  disgrace  which  attached  to 
the  order  of  the  court,  and  with  the  same  boyish  indignation  with 
which  he  tore  down  the  coffin  handbills  and  the  same  enthusiasm  with 
which  he  carried  the  resolutions  at  Jacksonville  he  came  to  the  defence 
of  the  man  whom  he  had  always  worshiped.     The  case  had  been 
fully,  ably  and  eloquently  argued  by  older  members  before  Douglas 
took  the  floor,  and  it  seemed  as  if  he  could  add  little  but  vehemence 
to  what  had  been  said.     But  stranger,  though  he  was,  he  rushed  to 
the  defence  of  General  Jackson,  declaring  that  what  had  been  done 
was  necessary  for  the  defence  of  New  Orleans  and  so  justifiable  under 
the  law,  that  the  action  of  the  judge  was  unjust,  irregular  and  illegal, 
and  without  jurisdiction.     Unhappily  for  himself  a  member  interrupted 
Douglas  by  asking  for  precedents  for  such  action  as  he  advocated, 
whereupon  Douglas  instantly  replied  that  he  presumed  that  there  could 
no  case  be  found  on  record,  or  traced  by  tradition,  where  a  fine  imposed 
upon  a  general  for  saving  his  country  at  the  expense  of  his  life  and 
reputation  ever  had  been  refunded  but  he  would  make  this  a  precedent 
for  future  action.     He  argued  that  in  times  of  war  and  desolation,  in 
times  of  peril  and  disaster,  it  was  the  substance  and  not  the  shadow 
of  things  that  should  be  considered.     He  envied  not  the  feelings  of 
the  man  who  could  calmly  and  coolly  reason  about  the  force  of  prece- 
dents and  the  tendency  of  examples  in  the  fury  of  the  war-cry  when 
"booty  and  beauty"  was  the  watchword.     The  man  whose  stoicism 
would  enable  him  to  philosophise  under  such  circumstances  would 
fiddle  while  the  capitol  was  burning  and  laugh  at  the  horror  and 
anguish  that  attended  the  conflagration.     The  speech  was  absolutely 
convincing,  the  resolution  was  carried,  the  fine  remitted,  and  Douglas's 
reputation  at  Washington  was  established. 

During  the  following  August  Douglas  addressed  a  mass-meet- 
ing of  Democrats  who  had  assembled  as  delegates  from  many  western 
states  at  Nashville.  This  was  in  connection  with  a  speaking  tour 


which  included  St.  Louis  and  numerous  other  points  whither  Douglas 
was  sent  by  the  Democratic  Central  Committee  with  gratifying  success. 
Thus  early  had  he  acquired  national  fame  as  an  orator.  He  was  in 
demand  in  states  remote  from  his  own  and  before  gatherings  of 
national  importance.  It  was  while  he  was  in  attendance  at  the  conven- 
tion at  Nashville  that  he  was  brought  face  to  face  with  Andrew 
Jackson  who  was  living  in  retirement  at  the  Hermitage.  Thither,  as 
to  a  Mecca,  all  good  Democrats  turned  their  faces  after  the  convention 
and  here  Douglas  received  a  welcome  that  warmed  the  cockles  of  his 
heart.  When  he  was  introduced  to  his  hero,  General  Jackson  raised 
his  still  brilliant  eyes  and  gazed  upon  the  countenance  of  his  defender. 
Still  retaining  his  hand,  the  General  asked  if  he  was  the  Mr.  Douglas 
of  Illinois  who  delivered  a  speech  at  the  last  session  of  Congress  on 
the  subject  of  the  fine  imposed  on  him  for  declaring  martial  law  at 
New  Orleans.  Douglas  modestly  replied  that  he  delivered  a  speech 
in  the  House  of  Representatives  on  that  subject,  whereupon  the  old 
warrior  bade  him  to  sit  down  beside  him  and  proceeded  to  thank 
him,  and  remarked  that  he  was  the  first  man  that  had  relieved  his 
mind  on  a  subject  which  had  rested  upon  it  for  thirty  years,  that  he 
was  convinced  in  his  own  mind  that  he  had  not  violated  the  laws  or 
constitution  of  his  country,  but  no  one  had  found  a  legal  justification 
until  Douglas  had  pointed  it  out  on  the  floor  of  Congress,  where  he 
had  established  it  beyond  the  possibility  of  cavil  or  doubt.  He  dis- 
missed Douglas  by  telling  him  that  he  could  go  down  to  his  grave  in 
peace  with  the  perfect  consciousness  that  he  had  not  broken  the  law. 
Douglas  was  speechless;  he  could  not  reply,  but  convulsively  shaking 
the  aged  veteran's  hand,  he  rose  and  left  the  hall. 

When  in  1844  Douglas  had  been  returned  to  the  House  by  an 
increased  majority  and  its  older  members  were  timidly  feeling  their 
way,  Douglas  introduced  a  joint  resolution  for  the  annexation  of 
Texas.  During  its  pendency  he  proposed  that  the  Missouri  Compro- 
mise line  of  36°  30"  should  be  preserved  as  a  settlement  of  the  slavery 
question  by  extending  it  through  the  new  territory.  A  similar  measure 
later  became  a  law.  In  his  speech  on  this  question  he  declared  that 
honor  and  violated  faith  required  the  immediate  annexation  of  Texas. 
This  speech  was  not  equalled  by  any  of  the  other  elaborate  speeches 
made  upon  that  subject.  Alexander  H.  Stevens  brought  the  slavery 

90 


question  into  the  case  and  he  and  a  group  of  Southern  associates  re- 
fused to  accept  any  terms  of  annexation  which  did  not  secure  the  right 
of  the  states  formed  from  the  territory  annexed  south  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise  line  to  come  into  the  Union  with  slavery  if  they  desired. 
Douglas  replied  that  such  states  should  be  admitted  into  the  Union 
ivith  or  without  slavery  as  the  people  in  each  should  determine  at  the 
time  of  their  application  to  Congress  for  admission.  This  proposition 
is  of  great  personal  and  historical  interest,  for  it  appears  to  be  the 
first  statement  by  Douglas  of  the  theory  of  popular  sovereignty  which 
became  the  fundamental  principle  with  him  for  the  settlement  of  the 
slavery  question.  Northern  men  demurred  to  this  proposition.  Doug- 
las saved  the  situation  by  an  amendment  which  provided  that  in  such 
states  as  should  be  formed  out  of  Texas  north  of  the  Missouri  line 
slavery  should  not  exist,  and  as  thus  amended,  the  joint  resolution 
passed.  Texas  included  at  this  time  a  part  of  what  is  now  New 
Mexico,  Colorado  and  Oklahoma. 

The  question  of  the  northwest  boundary  became  a  political  issue 
at  this  time.  It  was  coupled  with  the  Texas  question  in  the  Demo- 
cratic platform  of  1844.  Douglas  was  an  enthusiastic  expansionist 
and  so  gave  his  powerful  aid  to  both  propositions.  He  would  make 
the  re-occupation  of  Oregon  the  Democratic  slogan.  He  tried  to  im- 
press on  the  public  mind  the  importance  of  this  vast  territory  of  which 
then  little  was  known.  He  claimed  that  this  territory  stretched  from 
42°  north  latitude  to  54°  40"  north  latitude.  The  treaties  between 
Russia  and  Great  Britain  and  between  Russia  and  the  United  States 
had  fixed  the  southern  boundary  of  Russian  territory  on  the  continent 
at  54°  40",  and  a  treaty  between  the  United  States  and  Spain  had 
fixed  the  42nd  parallel  as  the  northern  boundary  of  the  Spanish  posses- 
sions, and  a  joint  treaty  between  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States 
had  established  the  manner  of  occupancy  of  this  territory  which  might 
be  terminated  by  either  party  on  twelve  months'  notice.  The  United 
States  and  Great  Britain  were  competitors  for  the  territory  between 
Russian  and  Spanish  lines.  Douglas  made  a  strong  argument  for 
our  claims  to  all  this  territory  on  the  ground  that  we  were  occupying 
and  possessing  the  Mississippi  valley  and  the  Great  West  which  was 
adjacent  to  the  territory  in  dispute.  In  furtherance  of  this  idea  he 
proposed  the  establishment  of  the  territory  of  Alaska  and  Oregon  to 

91 


protect  the  commerce  of  the  United  States  with  New  Mexico  and 
California,  as  well  as  emigration  to  Oregon.  This  failed  to  attract 
serious  attention  at  the  time  but  is  interesting  as  a  forerunner  of  what 
was  to  come.  When  at  a  later  time  the  committee  on  territories  re- 
ported a  bill,  boldly  extending  the  government  of  the  United  States 
over  the  whole  of  the  area  in  dispute,  and  the  opposition  in  derision 
referred  to  the  emigration  thither  as  "wandering  and  unsettled"  Doug- 
las was  quickly  on  his  feet  declaring  that  he  would  never  yield  an  inch 
to  Great  Britain  or  any  other  government  on  the  question  of  territory. 
He  looked  forward  to  the  time  when  Oregon  would  become  a  consider- 
able member  of  the  Great  American  Family.  He  was  for  erecting 
a  government  on  this  side  of  the  Rockies,  extending  over  settlements 
under  military  rule,  and  then  of  establishing  the  territorial  govern- 
ment of  Oregon.  As  for  Great  Britain  he  would  assert  our  rights 
to  the  last  inch  and  then  if  war  came,  let  it  come.  He  would  admin- 
ister Hannibal's  oath  of  eternal  enmity  and  would  not  terminate  the 
war  until  the  question  of  boundary  was  settled  forever.  He  would 
make  the  area  of  liberty  as  broad  as  the  continent  itself  and  would 
not  suffer  petty  rival  republics  to  grow  up  here.  An  ocean-bound 
republic  was  his  dream.  He  would  not  be  satisfied  while  Great 
Britain  held  one  acre  on  the  northwest  coast  of  America.  He  main- 
tained that  the  great  point  at  issue  between  us  and  Great  Britain  was 
for  the  freedom  of  the  Pacific  Ocean,  for  the  trade  of  China  and  Japan, 
and  of  the  East  Indies  and  for  the  maritime  ascendency  of  all  these 
waters.  President  Polk  compromised  with  Great  Britain  by  estab- 
lishing the  boundary  at  49°  north  latitude,  much  against  the  wishes 
of  Douglas,  who  maintained  that  had  we  been  firm  in  our  demands  we 
would  have  held  all  that  vast  territory  on  the  Pacific  Ocean  to  the  54th 
degree  of  north  latitude,  so  celebrated  in  our  day  as  the  great  wheat- 
growing  section  of  Canada.  We  would  have  likewise  controlled  the 
coast  with  its  harbors.  But  the  Mexican  war  was  at  hand  and  we 
could  not  be  involved  in  trouble  with  two  nations  at  one  time. 

In  1845,  on  the  opening  of  the  session  of  Congress,  Douglas  was 
appointed  chairman  of  the  committee  on  territories.  He  was  thirty- 
two  years  old.  It  was  at  a  time  when  the  territorial  questions  were 
of  vast  importance.  This  subject  engaged  his  best  talents  and  enlisted 
his  enthusiastic  interest.  In  this  department  of  his  public  service  he 


rose  to  the  zenith  of  his  power,  and  here  likewise  he  took  the  step 
that  brought  his  political  defeat.  But  it  was  his  fate  to  report  the 
bills  by  which  six  of  the  states  of  our  union  were  admitted  into  the 
great  sisterhood  and  seven  of  the  territories  were  organized. 

In  1845  Texas  was  admitted  into  the  Union  on  an  equal  footing 
with  the  original  states  in  all  respects  whatsoever.  Douglas  reported 
from  his  committee  a  joint  resolution  in  this  regard,  his  first  act  as 
chairman  of  the  committee  on  territories.  His  success  at  Washing- 
ton had  naturally  led  to  his  re-election  in  1846.  In  the  same  year 
President  Polk  announced  that  war  with  Mexico  existed,  and  told 
Douglas,  who  was  now  thirty-three,  that  he  could  lead  the  Demo- 
cratic party  in  the  House  of  Representatives  if  he  chose  to  do  so. 
The  venerable  Whig  statesman,  John  Quincy  Adams,  "old  man  elo- 
quent," as  he  was  called,  was  then  and  for  a  long  time  theretofore 
had  been  the  leader  in  that  branch  of  the  national  legislature.  Mr. 
Adams  had  had  a  distinguished  public  career.  His  father  was  the 
second  President  of  the  United  States.  Mr.  Adams  was  educated  at 
Harvard  and  fitted  for  the  law.  Early  in  life  his  political  fortunes 
begun.  He  represented  Massachusetts  in  the  United  States  Senate 
while  he  was  still  a  young  man.  Retiring  from  this  office  he  devoted 
his  great  learning  to  the  work  of  an  instructor  in  Harvard  College. 
Later  he  represented  this  country  in  several  of  the  great  courts  of 
Europe.  He  was  Secretary  of  State  under  President  Monroe  and 
the  author  of  the  Monroe  Doctrine.  In  1824  he  became  President 
but  was  unable  to  defeat  General  Jackson  as  a  candidate  for  re-election 
in  1828.  Had  his  career  ended  here  he  would  not  have  left  a  great 
name,  but  entering  the  House  after  his  retirement  from  the  presi- 
dency, contrary  to  all  precedents  before  or  since  he  rounded  out  a 
career  of  such  distinction  and  honor  as  has  seldom  fallen  to  the  lot  of 
any  statesman.  For  almost  two  decades  he  led  his  party  on  the  floor 
of  the  lower  house  where  he  literally  died  in  the  harness.  Able,  cul- 
tured, experienced  in  the  affairs  of  government  and  highly  trained  in 
the  arts  of  a  debater,  he  was  a  formidable  antagonist.  Moreover  he 
was  bitterly  opposed  to  the  Mexican  war  for  the  reason  that  he  be- 
lieved it  would  result  in  the  addition  of  slave  territory  to  the  Union 
and  would  give  the  slave-holding  states  a  numerical  advantage.  It 
was  against  an  opponent  thus  formidable  that  Douglas  was  arrayed 


when  he  took  the  floor  to  pass  an  appropriation  for  the  prosecution 
of  the  war  which  President  Polk  had  reported  was  begun.  Our 
justification  lay  in  the  fact,  if  such  it  was,  that  we  had  title  to  that 
tract  of  land  lying  between  the  Neuces  River  and  the  Rio  Grande  in 
the  State  of  Texas.  The  President  had  ordered  General  Taylor, 
whose  troops  were  on  the  east  of  the  Neuces  to  take  a  position  between 
that  river  and  the  Rio  Grande,  and  upon  doing  so  the  Mexicans  made 
an  attack  and  blood  was  shed.  If  we  owned  the  land  where  this  oc- 
curred then  we  were  rightfully  at  war  with  Mexico,  but  if  not  we 
were  invaders  without  right  on  the  territory  of  another  country.  The 
question  was  an  important  one  not  only  from  immediate  consequences 
but  from  those  that  were  remote  and  such  as  bore  on  the  acquisition 
of  territory.  Douglas  claimed  that  the  catalogue  of  aggressions  and 
insults,  of  outrages  on  our  national  flag — on  persons  and  property  of 
our  citizens — of  the  violation  of  our  treaty  stipulations,  and  the  mur- 
der, robbery  and  imprisonment  of  our  countrymen,  in  themselves 
would  have  furnished  a  just  cause  for  the  war.  But  referring  to  the 
question  of  title  he  maintained  with  characteristic  energy  and  positive- 
ness  that  the  Republic  of  Texas  held  the  country  on  the  left  bank  of 
the  Rio  Grande  by  virtue  of  a  successful  revolution.  The  United 
States  had  received  Texas  as  a  state  with  all  her  territory  and  had  no 
right  to  surrender  any  part  of  it.  The  right  to  hold  the  territory  be- 
tween the  two  rivers  named  was  based  on  the  treaty  made  with  Gen- 
eral Santa  Anna  after  the  battle  of  San  Jacinto,  which  acknowledged 
the  independence  of  Texas  and  recognized  the  Rio  Grande  as  its 
boundary.  At  this  point  the  aged  Massachusetts  statesman  inter- 
rupted the  new  leader  of  the  democracy  by  the  inquiry,  "Has  not  that 
treaty  with  Santa  Anna  been  since  discarded  by  the  Mexican  Govern- 
ment?" "I  presume  it  has,"  replied  Douglas,  "for  I  am  not  aware  of 
any  treaty  or  compact  which  that  government  ever  entered  into  that 
has  not  either  been  violated  or  repudiated  by  them  afterwards."  Santa 
Anna  as  recognized  dictator,  so  Douglas  claimed,  was  the  de  facto 
government  and  his  acts  were  binding  on  Mexico.  Forthwith  Texas 
had  established  counties  beyond  the  Neuces  and  extended  her  juris- 
diction over  the  territory  to  the  Rio  Grande  which  Mexico  had 
recognized  as  the  boundary,  and  the  United  States  had  extended  the 
revenue  laws  over  the  same  country — the  country  where  the  Ameri- 

04 


can  soldiers  had  been  slain.  Mr.  Adams  followed  Douglas  with  the 
keenest  interest  and  repeatedly  interrupted  him  as  he  advanced  in  his 
argument  so  that  the  latter,  almost  insensibly,  addressed  his  remarks 
to  Mr.  Adams.  They  were  in  striking  contrast,  the  aged  New  Eng- 
land statesman  and  the  young  westerner.  By  a  series  of  questions 
Douglas  had  made  Mr.  Adams  declare  that  the  western  boundary  of 
Texas  was  the  Neuces  and  not  the  Rio  Grande.  When  he  had  his  an- 
tagonist committed  to  this  position  so  firmly  that  it  could  not  be  es- 
caped, Douglas  produced  and  read  a  telegram  by  Mr.  Adams  to  Don 
Onis,  the  Spanish  minister,  written  in  1819,  when  he  was  Secretary 
of  State,  in  connection  with  the  cession  of  the  Floridas  to  us  and  the 
relinquishment  by  us  of  any  title  west  of  the  Sabine  and  Red  Rivers, 
in  which  he  said,  "Our  title  to  the  Rio  Grande  is  as  clear  as  to  the 
Island  of  New  Orleans."  To  this  Mr.  Adams  replied  that  he  wrote  the 
dispatch  as  Secretary  of  State  and  made  out  as  good  a  case  as  he  could 
for  his  country,  but  he  denied  that  he  claimed  that  the  line  followed 
the  river  to  the  full  length.  To  this  Douglas  answered  that  he  had 
heard  of  the  line  to  which  the  gentleman  referred  and  it  followed  a 
river  more  than  a  hundred  miles  above  Matamoras.  Consequently, 
taking  the  gentleman  on  his  own  claim,  the  position  occupied  by  Gen- 
eral Taylor  and  every  inch  of  ground  upon  which  an  American  soldier 
had  planted  his  foot  was  within  our  own  territory  as  claimed  by  him  in 
1819.  The  veteran  statesman  was  worsted  and  the  House  was  divided 
between  admiration  for  the  new  actor  on  the  national  stage  and  the 
retiring  statesman. 

While  Douglas'  fame  was  constantly  rising  in  the  House  and  his 
reputation  at  home  was  bringing  increased  majorities  on  each  election 
to  the  lower  House,  in  January,  1847,  he  was  elected  a  United  States 
senator.  For  six  years  he  had  been  a  potential  candidate  for  this  of- 
fice. Immediately  upon  taking  his  seat  in  the  Senate  he  was  appointed 
chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Territories.  This  was  a  position  of 
the  utmost  importance.  It  was  the  very  storm  center  of  politics.  Every 
question  of  territorial  organization  touched  the  peculiar  interests  of 
the  South.  The  varying  questions  of  public  opinion  crossed  in  this 
committee. 

In  1848  he  made  his  first  important  speech  in  the  Senate  on  the 
Mexican  war,  defending  the  course  of  the  administration.  Soon  a 


Mexican  treaty  was  submitted  in  which  provision  was  made  that  the 
boundary  line  established  should  be  religiously  respected  by  each  of 
the  two  republics  and  no  change  ever  made  therein  except  by  the  con- 
sent of  both  nations.  This,  he  claimed,  violated  a  great  principle  of 
public  policy  in  relation  to  this  continent;  it  pledged  the  faith  of  this 
republic  that  succeeding  generations  should  not  do  that  which  duty 
to  the  interests  and  honor  of  the  country  in  the  progress  of  events 
might  compel  them  to  do.  Being  an  ardent  expansionist  and  be- 
lieving that  the  limits  of  this  country  should  be  as  wide  as  possible  he 
opposed  any  treaty  restrictions  that  would  tie  our  hands.  In  this 
course  he  was  consistent  at  all  times.  A  striking  illustration  is  af- 
forded in  case  of  the  Clay  ton-Bui  wer  treaty  with  Great  Britain.  Doug- 
las saw  the  importance  not  only  of  our  building  the  canal  across  the 
isthmus  but  of  our  right  to  control  it,  and  in  this  he  was  half  a  century 
ahead  of  the  other  American  statesmen.  He  opposed  the  provisions  of 
the  treaty  because  they  would  hinder  and  embarrass  us  should  we  en- 
ter on  the  work  of  building  the  canal.  Looking  to  a  great  future, 
which  he  said  he  was  not  impatient  about,  he  inquired  of  his  fellow 
senators  how  long1  it  would  be  before  it  would  be  necessary  for  this 
country  to  construct  the  canal.  When  this  was  done  American  citizens 
would  settle  along  its  line  and  it  would  be  necessary  to  protect  them 
by  the  establishment  of  American  principles  and  institutions.  Hence 
he  was  unwilling  to  adopt  that  clause  in  the  treaty  guaranteeing  that 
neither  party  would  ever  "annex,  colonize,  or  occupy  any  portion  of 
Central  America."  Before  we  could  enter  into  negotiations  or  turn 
a  shovel  in  the  direction  of  building  the  Panama  canal,  the  Clayton- 
Bulwer  treaty,  against  the  blighting  effect  of  which  Douglas  warned 
his  countrymen  half  a  century  ago,  the  ratification  of  which  he  op- 
posed, had  to  be  abrogated.  The  provisions  of  the  treaty  were  en- 
tirely out  of  harmony  with  the  authority  which  the  United  States  must 
exercise  over  the  canal  zone.  With  tact,  courage  and  ability  John  Hay, 
as  Secretary  of  State,  succeeded  in  negotiating  with  Great  Britain  the 
Hay-Pauncefote  treaty,  which  abrogated  the  Clayton-Bulwer  treaty 
and  left  us  free  to  build  and  control  the  Panama  canal. 

We  come  now  to  the  most  interesting  part  in  the  life  of  Senator 
Douglas,  and  whatever  diversity  of  opinion  may  exist  as  to  him  there 
can  be  no  question  about  the  importance  of  his  career.  During  the 


next  ten  years  he  was  the  very  storm-center  of  national  events  and 
if  he  failed  to  see  the  right,  as  a  later  and  wiser  generation  has 
viewed  it,  there  can  be  no  denial  that  he  carried  his  part  with  con- 
summate ability,  and  he  should  be  credited  with  high  and  patriotic  mo- 
tives in  his  leadership  in  the  establishment  of  the  legislation  for  popular 
sovereignty.  On  the  conclusion  of  peace  with  Mexico,  that  nation  be- 
ing too  poor  to  pay  a  war  indemnity,  it  ceded  to  this  country  what  was 
then  known  as  California  and  New  Mexico,  out  of  which  these  two 
and  the  following  states  have  been  carved:  Nevada,  Arizona,  Utah 
and  part  of  Colorado  and  Wyoming.  This  area  stretched  westward 
from  Texas  to  the  Pacific.  The  northwest  boundary  had  been  estab- 
lished and  all  that  territory  was  ours  then  known  as  Oregon,  including 
the  present  states  of  Washington,  Oregon  and  Idaho,  as  was  likewise 
the  northwest  territory,  out  of  which  have  been  created  the  states  of 
Montana,  Wyoming,  Colorado  and  North  and  South  Dakota.  There, 
too,  was  the  Territory  of  Nebraska,  which  was  afterwards  divided  into 
the  states  of  Kansas  and  Nebraska.  From  a  tier  of  states  which 
bordered  the  Mississippi  on  the  east  to  the  Pacific  Ocean  on  the  west 
there  was  a  great  country  in  which  there  was  no  efficient  government 
or  organization,  save  such  as  resulted  from  the  Mormon  settlement. 
From  his  position  of  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Territories,  it  be- 
came the  duty  of  Senator  Douglas,  as  it  was  his  high  ambition,  to 
direct  the  legislation  which  should  lead  to  the  political  organization  of 
this  great  territory  embracing  geographically  half  of  the  United  States. 
It  was  sparsely  settled.  It  had  no  roads.  The  presence  of  the  In- 
dian added  to  the  dangers  and  hardships  of  exploitation.  Not  much 
was  known  of  a  large  part  of  this  section.  Gold  had  been  discovered 
in  California  and  emigrants  were  anxious  to  go  by  land,  as  well  as 
water,  to  this  field  of  opportunity.  The  difficulties  of  organization 
would  have  been  formidable  enough  to  have  challenged  the  ability 
of  the  ablest  statesman  had  not  the  question  of  the  extension  of  terri- 
tory been  tangled  fast  with  the  question  of  the  extension  of  slavery. 
The  balance  of  power  until  now  had  been  preserved  between  the  slave- 
holding  and  free  states  by  a  rule  which  admitted  no  free  state  unless 
a  slave  state  accompanied  it  into  the  Union.  To  keep  up  this  fine 
balance  was  the  task  which  the  south  imposed  on  the  statesmen  who 
were  charged  with  the  legislation  for  the  organization  of  new  states 

97 


and  territories.  Modern  inventions  and  the  growing  demand  for  cot- 
ton throughout  the  world  had  made  slave  labor  profitable.  The  slave 
holdings  amounted  to  a  vast  capitalization  and  it  was  in  the  interest  of 
the  investors  in  this  kind  of  property  that  the  field  for  slave  labor 
should  be  as  large  as  possible.  To  this  end  they  looked  to  new  terri- 
tory for  its  employment.  In  the  broad  new  field  now  about  to  be 
organized  into  states  and  territories  they  hoped  that  the  old  rule  would 
still  find  favor  for  preserving  the  balance  of  power,  and  that  the 
new  country  would  furnish  to  their  cherished  institution  opportunities 
for  expansion  and  profit.  Slavery  was  a  powerful  force  in  the  na- 
tional councils  and  one  that  had  to  be  reckoned  with  in  all  legislation 
affecting  it.  Douglas  had  met  with  scant  support  when  he  proposed 
before  this  to  organize  Oregon.  In  the  Northwest  Territory  slavery 
was  prohibited  by  the  ordinance  of  1787.  All  this  territory  was, 
moreover,  north  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  line.  The  Wilmot  pro- 
viso, which  was  pending  for  several  years  but  finally  failed  of  passage, 
provided  that  slavery  should  be  prohibited  in  the  territory  acquired  as 
a  result  of  the  Mexican  conquest.  The  Missouri  Compromise  for- 
bade slavery  in  the  territory  acquired  by  the  Louisiana  purchase  north 
and  west  of  the  State  of  Missouri,  36°  3(X  north  latitude,  but  admitted 
Missouri  as  a  slave  state. 

Senator  Douglas  although  succeeding  in  passing  an  act  extending 
the  Missouri  line  westward  across  the  State  of  Texas  was  not  success- 
ful in  a  similar  effort  to  extend  the  line  to  the  Pacific  Ocean.  On  the 
fourth  attempt  to  provide  a  territorial  government  for  Oregon  he  was 
only  successful  after  much  turmoil  and  an  exhausting  session  of  Con- 
gress. This  move  was  bitterly  opposed  by  the  southern  members  for 
the  reason  that  the  restrictive  clause,  borrowed  from  the  Ordinance 
of  1787,  against  slavery,  having  been  embraced  in  the  bill,  they  were 
fearful  of  the  consequences  of  the  precedent  thus  established.  The 
final  act  was  identical  with  the  one  Douglas  had  introduced  in  the 
House. 

In  1848  Cass  was  nominated  by  the  Democratic  party  for  the 
presidency  and  General  Taylor  received  the  nomination  of  the  Whig 
convention.  The  result  of  the  election  favored  the  Whigs  and  Gen- 
eral Taylor  became  president  but  he  died  a  short  time  after  his  in- 
auguration and  was  succeeded  by  the  vice-president,  Millard  Fillmore. 

98 


At  the  session  of  Congress  held  in  1848  Douglas  proposed  to  admit 
both  California  and  New  Mexico  as  one  state.  It  is  likely  he  wanted 
to  avoid  raising  the  specter  of  slavery.  If  California  could  come  at 
once  into  the  Union  she  could  create  her  own  institutions.  This  was 
a  forcible  application  of  the  principle  of  popular  sovereignty.  Folk's 
cabinet,  while  admitting  the  plan  to  be  ingenious,  did  not  lend  its  aid. 
The  president  wanted  a  bill  drafted  for  the  admission  of  New  Mexico 
separately  but  Douglas  refused.  The  bill  which  Douglas  had  drawn 
was  not  submitted  to  his  committee  but  to  the  judiciary  committee  of 
which  four  out  of  five  were  southerners.  They  reported  adversely  and 
the  bill  failed.  Several  further  unsuccessful  attempts  were  made  by 
Senator  Douglas  at  this  session  to  admit  California  and  New  Mexico. 
Finally  in  despair  he  exclaimed,  addressing  the  president  of  the  Senate, 
"Sir,  if  we  wish  to  settle  this  question  of  slavery  let  us  banish  the 
agitation  from  these  halls.  Let  the  people  of  such  states  settle  the 
question  of  slavery  within  their  limits,  as  they  would  settle  the  ques- 
tion of  banking,  or  any  other  domestic  institution,  according  to  their 
own  will."  Congress  failed  to  pass  any  bill  and  California  was  left 
to  its  own  devices. 

When  Congress  assembled  in  1849  the  Union  was  in  peril.  Never 
since  1821,  when  the  Missouri  Compromise  was  passed,  had  there  been 
such  alarm  for  the  safety  of  the  republic.  Slavery  was  knocking  for 
admission  to  the  new  territory  and  its  opponents  were  resisting  its  ap- 
proach. In  this  unsettled  and  unhappy  condition  of  affairs  Clay,  the 
great  Whig  statesman  and  orator,  heard  the  call  of  his  distracted 
country  and  came  forth  from  his  retirement  at  Ashland  to  lend  his  aid 
and  counsel  in  the  settlement  of  present  difficulties.  Webster,  too, 
the  great  New  England  statesman,  was  in  the  Senate,  as  were  Calhoun 
and  Cass  and  Benton  and  many  another  statesman  whose  name  had 
been  or  was  destined  to  become  famous  in  the  Senate.  It  was  as  dis- 
tinguished a  body  of  men  as  had  been  assembled  since  the  days  of  the 
American  Revolution.  It  contained  the  three  greatest  statesmen  this 
country  has  ever  known.  Douglas  had  introduced  two  bills,  one  for 
the  admission  of  California  as  a  free  state  and  one  for  the  organiza- 
tion of  Utah  and  New  Mexico  without  any  restriction  as  to  slavery. 
On  the  coming  of  Clay,  out  of  respect  for  his  great  wisdom  and 
leadership,  the  question  growing  out  of  the  slavery  agitation  and  em- 

99 


braced  in  the  organization  of  the  new  territory  were  submitted  to  a 
committee  of  thirteen,  of  which  he  was  made  chairman.  Clay  came 
forward  with  the  following  compromise: 

First:     To  admit  California  with  a  free  constitution. 

Second:  To  organize  territorial  governments  in  the  region  ac- 
quired from  Mexico  without  any  restriction  as  to  slavery. 

Third :  To  settle  the  question  of  the  boundary  of  Texas  and  the 
debt  due  her  on  a  fair  basis. 

Fourth :  To  prohibit  slave  trade,  but  not  slavery,  in  the  District 
of  Columbia. 

Fifth:  To  provide  more  carefully  for  the  return  of  fugitive 
slaves. 

This  compromise  was  carried  out  during  the  latter  part  of  the 
session  only  after  the  most  strenuous  efforts  on  the  part  of  its  friends. 
On  an  examination  of  the  bills  for  the  admission  of  California  and 
the  organization  of  Utah  and  New  Mexico,  drawn  by  Senator  Doug- 
las, Clay  found  that  they  could  not  be  improved  but  hesitated  about 
using  them  in  his  committee  as  this  would  seem  unfair  to  Douglas. 
The  latter  was  most  generous  and  received  the  gracious  thanks  of 
Clay  for  the  course  he  pursued  in  this  regard.  These  bills  were  fast- 
ened together  by  a  wafer  and  presented  in  what  was  known  as  the 
Omnibus  Bill.  No  changes  were  made  in  the  bills.  Douglas,  who  was 
a  careful  politician,  was  opposed  to  the  joining  of  the  two  measures, 
for  the  reason  that  the  friends  of  one  would  not  be  the  friends  of  the 
other  and  both  bills  might  fail.  A  protracted  and  exhausting  contest 
ensued  in  which  the  question  was  debated  by  the  great  men  then  in 
the  Senate.  Clay  himself  made  his  last  speech.  For  two  days  he 
pleaded  with  his  fellow  senators  and  with  his  divided  countrymen. 
Webster  made  his  seventh  of  March  speech  to  the  rage  and  sorrow  of 
New  England,  for  he  supported  the  compromise  measures.  He  made 
but  one  speech  after  this  in  the  Senate.  Calhoun  was  too  ill  to  ap- 
pear in  person  and  his  speech  was  read  by  Senator  Mason.  He  died 
soon  after.  Both  he  and  Senator  Davis  upon  whom  his  mantle  fell 
opposed  the  compromise  on  the  ground  that  slavery  in  the  territories 
was  guaranteed  by  the  Federal  constitution.  Chase  and  Seward  op- 
posed the  measure  because  they  thought  it  looked  to  the  extension  of 
slavery.  Cass  was  for  it  and  Benton  against  it.  The  debate  was  one 

100 


of  the  most  notable  in  the  history  of  the  country.  It  involved  in  the 
discussion  the  old  leaders  and  the  new  men  of  the  Senate,  but  no  one 
except  Clay  himself  had  such  a  part  in  the  settlement  as  Doug- 
las. Late  in  the  summer  after  Clay  had  been  exhausted  and  had 
retired,  all  but  the  part  relating  to  Utah  was  stricken  out  and  with 
that  single  passenger  the  Omnibus  went  through  the  Senate.  Then 
Douglas  promptly  brought  forward  his  bill  for  the  admission  of  Cali- 
fornia and  it  was  passed.  The  bill  fixing  the  boundary  of  Texas  was 
presented  and  passed.  Then  Douglas  brought  up  his  bill  for  the  or- 
ganization of  New  Mexico  and  it  was  passed.  A  more  stringent  slave 
law  was  adopted  and  the  slave  trade  in  the  District  of  Columbia  was 
abolished.  By  the  middle  of  September  the  work  of  the  important 
session  was  at  an  end.  The  great  principle  had  been  established  in  the 
language  of  Senator  Douglas  that  "the  people  could  form  and  regulate 
their  own  internal  concerns  and  institutions  in  their  own  way."  Sena- 
tor Davis,  with  whom  Douglas  had  been  in  frequent  debate  over  the 
measures,  declared  that  if  anyone  had  a  right  to  be  proud  of  the  suc- 
cess of  the  measures  it  was  the  senator  from  Illinois. 

When  Douglas  returned  to  Chicago,  to  which  city  he  had  removed 
in  1847,  he  found  an  aroused  and  maddened  populace.  The  passage 
of  the  fugitive  slave  law  was  the  cause  of  the  uprising.  The  Chicago 
Common  Council  had  passed  resolutions  the  night  previous  condemn- 
ing the  act  as  in  violation  of  the  constitution  and  the  laws  of  God  and 
calling  upon  the  officers  of  the  law  to  disregard  it.  A  mass  meeting 
was  about  to  pass  resolutions  approving  this  extraordinary  action  of 
the  council  and  denouncing  as  traitors  the  senators  and  representa- 
tives who  had  voted  for  the  law,  when  Douglas  walked  upon  the  stand 
and  announced  that  the  next  evening  he  would  publicly  defend  the 
measures  of  compromise,  and  demanded  to  be  heard  before  he  was 
condemned.  He  had  an  audience  such  as  had  never  before  assembled 
in  Chicago,  including  two-thirds  of  the  voters  of  the  city.  His  de- 
fence was  bold,  skilful,  successful.  He  avowed  his  authorship  of  three 
of  the  measures  and  his  approval  of  the  others.  He  took  them  up 
one  by  one,  explained  them  to  his  constituents  and  in  answer  to  re- 
peated questions  argued  out  and  elucidated  the  whole  subject.  At  the 
end  of  his  extraordinary  address  he  proposed  and  carried  resolutions 
pledging  the  meeting  to  stand  by  the  constitution  and  the  laws,  and 

101 


calling  upon  the  council  to  repudiate  its  action.  The  next  night  the 
council  met  and  repealed  the  offensive  resolutions.  Douglas'  triumph 
had  been  complete. 

President  Fillmore  signed  the  compromise  act  and  it  became  a 
law.  The  Legislature  of  Illinois  passed  resolutions  in  its  favor  and 
the  lower  House  of  Congress,  by  a  good  majority,  a  little  more  than  a 
year  later  voted  that  the  compromise  measures  should  be  regarded  as 
a  permanent  settlement.  The  two  great  parties,  Whig  and  Demo- 
cratic, in  the  conventions  of  1852  endorsed  the  measures  by  party 
platforms,  and  Rufus  Choate,  the  leader  of  the  New  England  bar 
and  the  spokesman  of  the  Whig  convention,  indulged  in  a  hyperbole 
as  he  exclaimed  "With  what  instantaneous  and  mighty  charm  they 
calmed  the  madness  and  anxiety  of  the  hour !" 

Unhappily  for  Senator  Douglas  the  slavery  question  was  not  set- 
tled by  the  compromise  of  1850  but  was  destined  to  be  brought  for- 
ward still  more  formidably  in  1854,  when  he  again  sought  to  organize 
Nebraska.  The  need  for  immediate  organization  seemed  imperative. 
The  territory  promised  a  fair  field  for  settlement,  and  organization 
meant  a  safer  passage  for  those  emigrants  who  would  go  to  the  re- 
gion farther  west.  It  would  have  a  further  effect,  too,  in  the  set- 
tlement of  Oregon.  Something  had  to  be  done  in  organization  of  the 
intervening  territory.  Nebraska  was  almost  a  passion  with  Douglas. 
As  early  as  1844  he  had  proposed  a  territorial  government  for  the 
region,  had  introduced  a  second  bill  in  1848  and  a  third  in  1852,  all 
of  which  were  designed  to  prepare  the  way  for  a  settled  government. 
The  proposition  to  settle  this  area  had  not  been  favored  by  the  south- 
ern representatives  who  declared  that  "new  swarms  should  not  leave 
the  old  hives."  They  did  not  care  for  its  organization  unless  it  was 
opened  to  slavery.  It  was  unlike  California,  Utah  and  New  Mexico 
which  came  to  us  as  a  result  of  the  Mexican  conquest.  It  came  to 
us  by  the  Louisiana  purchase  and  being  north  of  the  Missouri  line 
slavery  was  prohibited  therein.  But  the  prohibition  was  by  act  of 
Congress  and  Congress  might  either  directly  or  by  implication  undo  its 
act  and  make  slavery  lawful  in  the  new  territory.  In  1853  another 
bill  for  the  organization  of  Nebraska  was  introduced  in  the  Senate  and 
a  bill  to  admit  the  Territory  of  Washington  was  passed,  but  the  Ne- 
braska bill  hung  fire.  In  December  of  this  year  a  fifth  bill  was  intro- 

102 


duced  to  organize  Nebraska,  similar  to  the  one  introduced  at  the  last 
session,  and  the  same  was  referred  to  the  committee  of  which  Senator 
Douglas  was  chairman.  While  this  bill  was  pending  certain  newspapers 
which  were  supposed  to  voice  the  sentiments  of  Senator  Douglas  pre- 
dicted that  Nebraska  would  be  organized  on  the  same  basis  as  Utah 
and  New  Mexico,  and  that  the  climate,  nature  and  necessary  pursuits 
of  the  people,  who  would  occupy  the  territory,  would  establish  its 
status  as  free  territory. 

It  was  apparent  that  some  way  to  conciliate  the  south  must  be 
found  before  Nebraska  could  be  organized.  Already  one  of  the  sena- 
tors from  Missouri  had  announced  that  the  organization  would  be  op- 
posed unless  the  Missouri  Compromise  was  repealed.  In  January, 
1854,  a  report  was  made  to  the  Senate,  recommending  that  the  section 
of  the  compromise  relating  to  slavery  be  declared  null  and  void.  A 
substitute  measure  provided  that  when  states  were  admitted  into  the 
Union  they  should  be  received  with  or  without  slavery  as  their  con- 
stitution declared  at  the  time  of  admission.  This  had  been  the  way 
with  California.  A  further  provision  left  the  people  of  a  territory  free 
to  decide  whether  slavery  should  exist  or  not  before  the  organization 
of  a  state  government.  This  was  a  principle  which  Senator  Douglas 
claimed  for  Utah  and  New  Mexico.  The  opinion  that  Senator  Doug- 
las wanted  to  open  Nebraska  to  slavery,  which  was  rather  widely  en- 
tertained at  the  time,  was  not  well  founded  and  search  will  be  made  in 
vain  for  either  speech  or  act  to  justify  such  a  conclusion.  In  fair- 
ness to  the  great  statesman  it  ought  to  be  admitted  at  this  day  that  he 
did  not  so  believe  and  that  the  conclusion  was  unwarranted.  Four 
years  previously  he  had  declared  that  the  prairies  were  dedicated 
to  freedom  by  a  law  above  human  power  to  repeal ;  that  the  climate, 
topography  and  the  condition  of  slave  labor  all  forbade  slavery  in  the 
unoccupied  areas  of  the  West. 

When  Senator  Dixon,  in  January,  1854,  offered  an  amendment 
to  the  Nebraska  bill  with  an  express  stipulation  that  slavery  might 
exist  in  the  territory  as  though  the  compromise  had  not  been  passed, 
Senator  Douglas  was  reluctant  to  take  so  radical  a  position,  although 
he  had  declared  that  the  compromise  was  no  longer  of  practical  force, 
as  the  acts  of  1850  had  established  another  principle  for  the  govern- 
ment of  territory  north  of  the  Missouri  line.  Not  without  serious 

103 


misgivings,  however,  and  the  contemplation  of  the  momentous  con- 
sequences that  would  attach  to  such  a  course  did  Senator  Douglas 
finally  agree  to  support  the  measure.  But  he  knew  that  the  repeal 
was  consistent  with  his  theory  of  popular  sovereignty  and  with  its 
adoption  that  great  principle  could  have  broad  application.  It  was 
the  same  principle,  as  he  claimed,  that  was  expressed  in  the  acts  ad- 
mitting Utah  and  New  Mexico.  On  the  7th  of  February  he  proposed 
an  amendment  to  the  pending  bill  which  provided  that  inasmuch  as 
the  Missouri  Compromise  was  inconsistent  with  the  principle  of  non- 
intervention it  was  declared  inoperative  and  void,  it  being  the  true 
intent  and  meaning  of  the  act  not  to  legislate  slavery  into  any  territory 
or  state  nor  to  exclude  it  therefrom,  but  to  leave  the  people  thereof 
perfectly  free  to  form  and  regulate  their  domestic  institutions  in 
their  own  way,  subject  only  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States. 
Thus  was  the  doctrine  of  popular  sovereignty  engrafted  upon  the 
federal  law. 

The  discussion  and  events  that  attended  the  passage  of  the  Kansas- 
Nebraska  act,  for  it  had  been  decided  to  make  two  territories  out  of 
Nebraska,  were  by  far  the  most  important  and  disastrous  in  Douglas's 
career.  The  great  senators,  Webster,  Clay,  Calhoun  had  passed  from 
the  scene  and  Douglas  was  left  the  most  able,  aggressive  and  con- 
spicuous debater  in  the  Senate.  He  had  succeeded  Clay  as  the  great 
compromiser.  He  was  in  full  command  of  the  pending  legislation. 
The  Senate  was  not  then  lacking  in  other  great  men,  for  the  vital 
importance  and  absorbing  interest  of  the  slavery  question,  if  no  other 
cause,  had  sent  to  the  highest  law-making  body  at  Washington  an 
array  of  talent  such  as  has  rarely  been  assembled  there  in  any  other 
era  of  our  national  life.  Chase  of  Ohio,  Seward  of  New  York, 
Sumner  and  Everett  of  Massachusetts,  were  among  the  most  con- 
spicuous members  from  the  northern  states  but  to  those  could  be 
added  many  others  that  were  well  known  in  all  parts  of  the  country. 
The  best  men  of  the  South  were  naturally  on  duty,  too,  in  the  Senate. 
Sumner,  Chase  and  Seward  attacked  Douglas  with  all  the  great  ability 
at  their  command  and  in  elaborate  and  set  speeches  sought  to  over- 
come him  in  debate.  The  issue  seemed  so  certain  that  he  preferred 
not  to  speak  on  the  bill  but  his  friends  prevailed  on  him  to  close  the 
debate,  as  it  was  his  right  to  do  as  chairman  of  the  committee.  Long 

104 


before  the  hour  arrived  for  him  to  address  the  Senate  all  available 
space  for  visitors  was  taken  by  an  eager  and  expectant  throng  who  had 
gathered  to  hear  the  exponent  of  popular  sovereignty  close  the  debate. 
For  hours  he  attracted  the  admiration  of  his  hearers  who  gave  him 
frequent  applause  as  he  upheld  his  position  against  the  combined 
assault  of  the  abolition  Senators.  No  one  attacked  him  during  this 
speech  unless  it  was  to  the  discomfiture  of  the  Senator  interrupting 
him,  and  as  often  as  he  returned  to  the  discussion  of  the  issue,  after 
an  interruption,  he  left  the  impression  that  these  highly  moral  men, 
who  were  armed  with  a  just  cause,  were  culprits  and  he  their  inquisitor, 
and  so  genuine  and  commanding  was  his  eloquence  and  so  able  his 
argument,  that  even  Seward,  on  begging  for  an  interruption  in  order 
that  he  might  make  an  explanation,  said,  "I  have  never  had  so  much 
respect  for  him  as  I  have  tonight."  While  the  bill  passed  the  Senate 
by  a  large  majority  the  vote  was  closer  in  the  House.  Douglas  took 
charge  of  the  contest  in  the  House,  in  so  far  as  generalship  and  advice 
were  concerned,  and  by  May  the  bill  passed  and  received  the  President's 
signature. 

The  passage  of  this  measure  created  the  greatest  opposition  and 
excitement  throughout  the  North.  But  a  handful  of  northern  repre- 
sentatives who  voted  for  the  measure  were  returned  at  the  next  election. 
It  meant  to  this  portion  of  our  land  the  unlocking  of  the  doors  to  the 
admission  of  slavery  to  the  unoccupied  prairies  of  the  West.  To 
Douglas  it  had  no  such  meaning.  He  looked  upon  the  legislation  as 
opening  the  way  for  the  practical  operation  of  a  rule  by  which  the 
slavery  question  would  be  banished  from  the  halls  of  Congress  to 
become  a  local  question  in  each  state  and  territory.  Here  the  people, 
who  were  as  intelligent  as  he  and  as  moral  and  as  much  accountable 
to  man  and  God,  could  determine  what  place,  if  any,  the  institution 
of  slavery  should  have,  and  adopting  it  as  an  institution  could  make 
the  necessary  laws  for  its  protection.  It  was  thus  made  a  matter  of 
local  option.  The  local  inhabitants  could  have  it  or  reject  it.  He 
would  have  them  entirely  responsible  for  all  laws  relative  to  master 
and  slave  as  they  were  for  the  laws  governing  the  relation  of  parent 
and  child,  husband  and  wife,  guardian  and  ward  and  master  and 
servant. 


105 


When  Douglas  returned  to  his  home  from  the  scene  of  his  fatal 
triumph  he  found  the  flags  at  half-mast  and  the  bells  were  tolling. 
He  announced  to  his  constituents  that  he  would  address  them  on  the 
subject  of  the  Kansas- Nebraska  bill  on  the  following  night  and  he 
looked  forward  to  such  a  triumph  as  had  accompanied  his  speech 
on  the  compromise  of  1850.  But  there  was  trouble  everywhere,  his 
personal  friends  turned  away,  the  rank  and  file  of  his  party  were  in 
distrust.  For  more  than  two  hours  he  stood  before  an  angry  mob 
and  tried  to  silence  them  so  that  he  might  speak  but  it  was  of  no  avail. 
The  die  was  cast.  The  meeting  had  been  organized  for  just  such  a 
result  by  the  Abolitionists  of  Chicago.  Moreover,  it  was  in  part 
armed  in  the  expectation  of  the  use  of  force.  Had  Douglas  appeared 
with  a  similar  organization,  as  it  was  whispered  he  would  do,  blood- 
shed would  have  been  inevitable.  Indignation  was  at  high-water  mark 
and  nothing  but  the  coolness  and  fearlessness  of  the  great  Senator 
prevented  an  outbreak.  As  it  was  he  was  assaulted  on  his  way  to  his 
hotel  and  escaped  with  difficulty.  It  was  found  out  presently  that  the 
spirit  of  the  Chicago  mob  was  abroad  over  the  whole  North,  and 
Douglas  afterwards  said  that  at  this  time  he  could  have  ridden  from 
Boston  to  Chicago  by  the  light  of  his  burning  effigies. 

Whatever  force  there  was  to  his  argument,  and  that  of  Webster 
in  his  speech  of  the  seventh  of  March,  that  climate  and  natural  condi- 
tions would  determine  where  slavery  would  exist,  and  of  that  other 
argument,  that  whatever  the  right  or  wrong  of  the  question  was,  the 
local  inhabitants  were  the  proper  parties  on  whom  the  duty  fell  to 
decide,  Douglas,  if  he  was  moved  at  all  by  politic  considerations,  had 
failed  to  gauge  from  a  sentimental  point  of  view,  the  almost  religious 
depth  of  the  anti-slavery  feeling  in  that  very  stock  from  which  he  had 
himself  sprung.  He  was  not  a  slave  holder  and  never  had  been. 
His  first  wife,  a  Southern  woman  of  rare  charm  and  culture,  was  the 
daughter  of  a  slave  holder  and  upon  her  death  the  Douglas  children 
became  the  owners  of  a  plantation  with  slaves.  But  Douglas  himself 
never  had  any  interest  in  any  slave  property,  although  his  father-in- 
law,  Colonel  Martin,  desired  to  bestow  a  portion  of  his  estate  upon 
him,  thus  giving  him  the  control  of  a  certain  number  of  slaves.  This 
Douglas  declined  and  refused  to  have  anything  to  do  with  the  owner- 
ship of  slaves. 

IM 


The  result  of  the  campaign  of  1856  was  the  election  of  Buchanan 
as  President.  The  Republican  party  was  organized  and  its  first  ticket 
was  in  the  field.  Its  essential  policy  was  opposition  to  the  extension 
of  slavery.  It  was  bitterly  opposed  to  the  act  of  1854,  for  this  legisla- 
tion meant,  as  the  party  viewed  it,  the  extension  of  slavery.  The 
signs,  as  read  from  this  quarter,  were  unmistakable.  If  slavery  were 
to  find  a  home  in  any  of  the  new  territory  it  was  agreed  that  Kansas 
presented  the  most  hopeful  field.  It  became  the  pivotal  point  in  the 
contest  between  freedom  and  slavery.  It  was  agreed  that  Nebraska 
was  not  inviting  territory  for  the  institution.  Events  came  in  rapid 
succession.  On  the  4th  of  March,  1857,  Buchanan  was  inaugurated, 
a  Democrat  and  a  representative  of  southern  interests.  Two  days 
later  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  decided  the  Dred  Scott 
case,  in  which  the  court  held  that  a  negro  descended  from  slave  parents 
was  not  a  citizen  and  that  the  Missouri  Compromise  was  unconstitu- 
tional. This  opinion  was  in  harmony  with  the  opinion  entertained  by 
Southern  statesmen,  that  before  the  organization  of  a  state  govern- 
ment slavery  was  guaranteed  in  the  territories  by  the  Federal  Constitu- 
tion. If  this  was  true  what  became  of  the  theory  of  popular 
sovereignty?  If  the  constitution  protected  slavery  in  the  territories 
how  could  the  inhabitants  thereof  either  "vote  it  down  or  vote  it  up?" 
This  was  the  crucial  question  in  the  great  debate  between  Douglas 
and  Lincoln  in  1858.  The  question  here  as  propounded  by  Lincoln 
was,  "Can  the  people  of  a  United  States  territory,  in  any  lawful  way 
against  the  wish  of  any  citizen  of  the  United  States,  exclude  slavery 
from  its  limits  prior  to  the  formation  of  a  state  constitution?"  This 
question  and  Douglas's  answer  have  been  credited  with  having  de- 
termined the  fate  of  Douglas  and  his  party  in  1860.  The  answer 
was  in  the  affirmative.  Douglas  declared  that  slavery  could  not  exist 
except  by  the  protection  of  local  laws  and  as  these  must  reflect  local 
sentiment,  if  the  inhabitants  of  a  territory  wished  to  exclude  slavery 
they  could  pass  such  laws  as  would  make  its  existence  impossible. 
It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  Douglas  was  forced  to  answer  this 
question  hurriedly  or  in  a  manner  other  than  according  to  his  settled 
convictions  and  carefully  thought-out  opinion.  As  early  as  June,  1857, 
he  had  given  his  opinion  on  the  Dred  Scott  decision,  as  it  related  to 
popular  sovereignty,  by  affirming  that  while  the  right  continued  in  full 

107 


force  under  the  constitution  and  could  not  be  divested  or  alienated  by 
an  act  of  Congress  it  would  necessarily,  nevertheless,  remain  a  barren 
and  worthless  right  unless  sustained,  protected  and  enforced  by  appro- 
priate police  regulations,  and  local  legislation  prescribing  adequate 
remedies  for  its  violation,  which  would  necessarily  depend  upon  the 
will  and  wishes  of  the  people  of  the  territory. 

We  are  about  to  see  the  principle  of  popular  sovereignty  in  prac- 
tical operation.  Kansas  becomes  the  center  of  interest.  Its  popula- 
tion had  been  greatly  augmented  by  the  efforts  of  the  emigrant  aid 
societies,  which  had  sent  great  numbers  into  Kansas  to  make  it  a  free 
state,  and  by  the  efforts  of  the  slave  holders  in  Missouri,  who  had 
sent  thither  a  large  representation  of  pro-slavery  voters.  A  good 
many  of  the  latter  did  not  become  permanent  residents  of  the  proposed 
state,  their  mission  being  to  establish  Kansas  as  a  slave  state  and 
then  to  return  to  Missouri.  The  pro-slavery  party  called  what  is 
known  in  history  as  the  Lecompton  convention.  This  convention 
proceeded  to  adopt  a  slave  constitution  and  with  it  knocked  for  ad- 
mission to  the  Union.  The  free-state  party  took  no  part  in  the 
election  of  delegates  to  this  convention  because  the  election  was  based 
on  a  defective  census  and  registration.  It  was  furthermore  promised 
by  the  federal  authorities  that  a  submission  should  be  made  to  a 
popular  vote  of  any  constitution  which  the  prospective  convention 
might  adopt.  Some  months  after  the  Lecompton  convention  was 
held  the  free-state  party  abandoned  its  policy  of  not  participating  in 
local  elections,  and  voting  for  a  territorial  Legislature,  the  result  was 
a  decisive  free  state  victory.  It  was  thus  apparent  that  though  the 
pro-slavery  party  could  make  such  a  constitution  as  they  liked,  the 
free  state  party  could  vote  it  down.  The  question  in  the  first  place 
was,  did  the  Lecompton  convention  represent  the  choice  of  the  voters 
of  Kansas,  and  in  the  second  place  should  the  vote  taken  be  accepted 
as  the  final  test  for  the  admission  of  the  state,  or  should  the  constitu- 
tion be  submitted  to  the  people  for  ratification  or  rejection?  When 
the  results  of  the  constitutional  convention  became  known  it  turned 
out  that  not  the  whole  of  the  constitution  was  to  be  submitted  to 
a  popular  vote  but  only  the  part  relating  to  slavery.  The  people 
might  vote  for  the  constitution  with  slavery  or  without  slavery.  In 
either  event  the  constitution  would  be  approved.  But  should  the  free 

108 


state  party  succeed,  then  a  provision  still  guaranteed  the  right  of 
property  in  slaves  then  in  the  territory,  and  further  provided  if  it 
was  amended  after  1864,  that  no  alteration  should  be  made  to  affect 
the  rights  of  property  in  slaves.  Douglas  was  stirred  to  the  depths 
by  the  proposition  of  President  Buchanan  to  submit  the  Lecompton 
constitution  to  Congress  for  ratification  without  referring  it  to  the 
voters  of  Kansas  for  their  acceptance  or  rejection.  In  short  the 
President  was  for  making  Kansas  a  slave  state  regardless  of  the  will 
of  the  inhabitants.  This  was  the  very  opposite  of  popular  sovereignty. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  session  of  1857  Senator  Douglas  called 
on  the  President  and  warned  him  that  he  opposed  the  plan  of  admitting 
Kansas  on  the  pending  constitution  unless  the  same  should  be  ratified 
by  a  vote  of  the  territory.  The  interview  was  a  heated  one.  When 
Douglas  threw  down  the  gauntlet  by  declaring  that  he  would  oppose 
the  policy  of  the  President  to  the  bitter  end,  the  President  sternly 
reminded  him  that  no  Democrat  ever  yet  had  differed  from  an 
administration  of  his  own  choice  without  being  crushed.  To  this 
Douglas  replied  that  he  wished  the  President  to  remember  that  General 
Jackson  was  dead.  On  the  following  day,  in  a  three-hour  speech, 
he  denounced  the  convention  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate,  declaring  that 
while  he  did  not  care  whether  slavery  was  voted  down  or  voted  up, 
he  did  want  a  free  choice  made  by  the  people  of  Kansas.  His 
sense  of  honor,  consistency  and  abiding  faith  in  the  justice  of  the 
great  principle  of  popular  sovereignty  prompted  him  to  insist  that 
the  constitution  of  a  territory  should  not  receive  the  sanction  of  Con- 
gress unless  it  represented  the  popular  will. 

While  it  was  apparent  that  the  majority  in  Kansas  was  over- 
whelmingly against  the  convention  which  proposed  the  constitution, 
the  President  was  insistent  and  in  a  message  to  Congress  recommended 
the  admission  of  Kansas  with  the  slave  constitution,  declaring  that 
Kansas  was  as  much  a  slave  state  then  as  Georgia  or  South  Carolina. 
Friends  of  the  convention  confidently  maintained  that  Congress  had 
no  alternative  but  to  accept  its  provisions.  To  this  Douglas  replied 
that  it  was  the  right  and  duty  of  Congress  to  prevent  the  admission 
of  Kansas  except  on  such  a  constitution  as  its  people  approved. 

The  situation  in  which  Senator  Douglas  now  found  himself  was 
one  of  the  most  unique,  alarming  and  remarkable  that  ever  confronted 

Mt 


a  man  in  our  national  life.  As  the  leader  of  the  Senate,  on  the 
question  of  the  greatest  public  interest  and  concern,  he  had  broken 
with  the  administration  which  represented  his  own  party.  The  Presi- 
dent, for  this  rash  act,  sought  to  crush  him;  the  party  press  was 
turned  against  him;  his  political  friends  in  Illinois,  who  had  been 
favored  by  the  federal  appointments,  were  turned  out  of  office  to 
make  places  for  his  enemies ;  he  was  denounced  as  a  traitor,  renegade 
and  deserter.  In  March,  1858,  he  rose  from  a  sick  bed  to  make  his 
final  appeal  against  the  measure.  The  announcement  that  he  would 
speak  had  attracted  a  great  gathering  of  spectators  to  the  Senate. 
They  came  in  the  early  morning  and  refused  to  leave  their  seats  upon 
learning  that  Douglas  would  not  speak  until  evening.  Demand  for 
room  was  such  that  the  ladies  were  admitted  to  the  floor  of  the  Senate. 
In  this,  one  of  his  most  eloquent  speeches,  he  declared  his  independence 
as  a  Senator  and  his  right  to  act  independently  of  the  executive  and 
not  at  his  dictation.  With  dramatic  effect  he  declared  that  official 
position  had  no  charms  for  him  when  deprived  of  that  freedom 
of  thought  and  action  which  becomes  a  gentleman  and  a  Senator. 

He  was  unable  to  break  the  forces  of  the  administration 
sufficiently  to  defeat  the  measure  in  the  Senate,  but  his  efforts  had 
borne  fruit  at  the  other  end  of  the  capitol  where  the  House  voted 
to  submit  the  constitution  to  the  people  of  Kansas.  From  a  committee 
of  compromise  a  bill,  known  as  the  English  bill,  was  submitted,  which 
provided  for  a  grant  of  public  lands  to  Kansas  in  case  the  Lecompton 
constitution  was  endorsed  by  the  voters  of  the  territory.  If  the  vote 
favored  the  constitution  then  Kansas  was  to  be  admitted  as  a  slave 
state  on  the  proclamation  of  the  President.  Douglas  refused  to  vote 
for  the  committee's  bill  on  the  ground  that  it  held  out  a  bribe  to  the 
voters  of  Kansas.  The  bill  passed,  however,  but  by  mid-summer 
Kansas  had  recorded  nearly  ten  thousand  votes  against  the  land 
ordinance  and  proposed  constitution.  The  administration  had  failed 
to  make  Kansas  a  slave  state  and  Douglas  had  triumphed. 

In  spite  of  the  efforts  of  the  administration  to  ruin  his  political 
career,  in  the  spring  of  1858,  the  Democratic  convention  of  Illinois 
unqualifiedly  endorsed  Douglas  for  United  States  Senator.  His  term 
was  about  to  expire.  In  June  of  that  year  the  Republican  convention 
named  Abraham  Lincoln  for  United  States  Senator.  An  antagonist 

no 


was  about  to  meet  Douglas  more  formidable  than  any  with  whom  he 
had  measured  swords  in  the  halls  of  Congress.  A  new  truth  was 
brought  forward  by  this  opponent,  expressed  in  words  which  the 
gathering  years  have  given  the  force  of  a  solemn  judgment :  "A  house 
divided  against  itself  cannot  stand.  I  believe  that  this  government 
cannot  endure  permanently  half  slave  and  half  free.  I  do  not  expect 
the  Union  to  be  dissolved — I  do  not  expect  the  house  to  fall — but  I 
do  expect  it  will  cease  to  be  divided.  It  will  become  all  one  thing 
or  all  the  other."  Douglas's  eyes  came  across  these  words  as  he  read 
the  speech  of  his  rival  on  his  return  to  Illinois  from  Washington  and 
they  made  such  an  impression  on  his  mind  that  in  his  first  address  he 
discussed  their  meaning  and  rarely  afterwards  failed  to  refer  to 
them  during  the  debate  over  the  senatorship.  Did  this  mean  that  war 
was  to  be  made  upon  slavery  until  it  was  exterminated  ? 

The  reception  that  was  given  Douglas  this  time  by  the  City  of 
Chicago  was  in  striking  contrast  to  his  welcome  after  his  return  follow- 
ing the  passage  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill.  In  the  place  of  tolling 
bells,  flags  at  half  mast  and  an  angry  mob,  he  was  met  by  a  special  train 
and  received  with  every  sign  of  popular  enthusiasm.  In  a  carriage 
drawn  by  six  horses,  under  military  escort,  amid  the  booming  of 
cannon  and  the  shouts  of  thousands  in  his  praise,  with  banners  flutter- 
ing in  the  breeze  and  in  the  light  of  fireworks  and  illumination  he 
entered  his  beloved  city. 

The  slavery  question  was  about  to  be  argued  out  on  the  prairies 
of  Illinois.  The  two  disputants  could  not  have  been  more  unlike. 
One  had  gone  to  Illinois  from  the  northern  state  of  Vermont,  the 
other  from  the  southern  state  of  Kentucky.  One  was  a  Democrat, 
the  other  a  Whig.  They  had  always  been  political  opponents.  One 
had  outstripped  all  rivals  in  his  rapid  advancement  to  political  fame 
and  was  the  best  known  and  most  distinguished  member  of  his  party; 
the  other  had  held  but  few  offices  and  for  ten  years  had  been  in  private 
life  and  was  not  much  known  outside  his  own  state.  One  had  re- 
ceived his  inspiration  in  the  rush  and  whirl  of  active  affairs  at  the 
national  capitol ;  the  other  had  formed  his  political  opinions  while 
riding  the  circuit  in  the  practice  of  law.  One  was  allied  with  the  rich 
and  powerful  influences  of  the  nation;  the  other  was  better  known 
by  the  common  people.  One  had  the  gift  of  mental  grasp  that  worked 

111 


by  intuition  and  could  argue  out  a  question  to  its  last  analysis  without 
reflection  or  forethought ;  the  other  learned  slowly  and  stated  his  argu- 
ment well  only  when  he  had  given  it  patient  consideration.  In  place 
of  the  assurance  of  the  one  was  the  brooding  melancholy  of  the 
other.  Douglas  spoke  with  the  utmost  readiness  and  was  gifted 
with  all  the  graces  of  the  orator.  Lincoln  spoke  slowly,  and  except 
when  aroused,  was  awkward  in  manner  and  gesture.  Douglas  was 
almost  a  dwarf  in  height  although  now  thick-set  and  solid  in  appear- 
ance; Lincoln  was  tall  and  slight.  Douglas  had  a  deep  bass  voice  of 
great  carrying  power ;  Lincoln's  was  a  high  falsetto  when  in  use  before 
great  audiences.  Douglas  wore  the  clothes  of  fashionable  Washing- 
ton; in  this  regard  he  was  immaculate.  Lincoln's  were  ill-fitting, 
much  worn  and  unbecoming.  One  was  an  ardent  disciple  of  party 
platforms  and  creeds ;  the  other  was  moved  by  the  moral  issues  that 
were  involved  in  political  questions. 

When  Lincoln  challenged  Douglas  to  the  joint  debates  he  had 
nothing  to  lose  and  everything  to  gain.  If  he  failed  he  was  no  worse 
off  than  before,  but  if  he  won  over  such  a  man  as  Senator  Douglas 
such  a  triumph  could  not  fail  to  bring  him  into  great  national 
prominence.  This  was  the  result.  When  the  debates  began  Lincoln 
was  not  well  known  outside  of  his  own  state.  When  they  ended  he 
had  a  national  reputation.  It  was  Senator  Douglas  that  gave 
prominence  to  the  discussion.  He  could  not  discuss  slavery,  or  any 
other  national  question,  without  attracting  the  whole  country.  At 
every  fireside  his  speeches  were  read.  In  this  way  Lincoln  received 
his  introduction  to  the  American  people.  His  speeches  were  reported 
with  those  of  Douglas  and  thus  his  fame  went  abroad  and  the 
presidency  was  made  possible  for  him.  It  is  not  likely  that  he  would 
have  received  the  nomination  had  it  not  been  for  the  debates. 

The  time  was  favorable  for  Lincoln.  The  Republican  party  was 
organized  and  had  gathered  to  its  banners  all  the  opposing  forces  to 
Democracy  in  Illinois.  It  had  declared  against  the  further  extension 
of  slavery  in  the  new  territories.  The  recent  measures  for  the  settle- 
ment of  the  vexed  question  had  not  had  the  desired  effect.  Instead 
of  peace  popular  sovereignty  had  brought  bloodshed  to  Kansas  and 
the  end  was  not  yet.  President  Buchanan's  pro-slavery  inaugural, 
the  Dred  Scott  decision  and  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise 

112 


furnished  material  for  a  skilful  argument  that  there  was  a  conspiracy 
to  extend  slavery.  The  administration  was  opposed  to  Douglas  and 
he  had  to  fight  at  all  times  with  an  enemy  in  the  rear. 

In  the  questions  and  answers,  the  personalities,  the  give-and-take 
of  the  discussion,  which  occurred  at  seven  points  in  the  state,  ranging 
from  the  north  to  the  south,  the  fortunes  of  the  two  disputants  were 
very  much  alike.  In  the  early  part  of  the  debate  Douglas  seemed 
to  have  the  advantage  and  in  the  latter  part  Lincoln  made  gains. 
The  debates  attracted  large  audiences  who  listened  with  the  closest 
attention.  The  great  issue  in  the  debate  was  a  moral  one.  Lincoln 
took  the  position  that  slavery  was  morally  wrong  and  so  its  further 
extension  should  be  prevented.  Douglas  took  no  sides  on  the  moral 
question.  To  him  it  was  a  question  of  practical  politics.  Lincoln 
said  he  was  not  in  favor  of  making  voters  or  jurymen  or  office-holders 
or  even  citizens  of  negroes,  but  he  did  expect  them  to  be  freemen ;  he 
did  not  expect,  however,  in  the  most  peaceful  way  that  slavery  would 
be  ultimately  extinguished  in  less  than  a  hundred  years  at  least,  but 
he  believed  it  would  occur  in  the  best  way  for  both  races  in  God's 
good  time.  Douglas  made  a  forcible  and  comprehensive  statement  of 
his  side  of  the  case  by  declaring  that  the  people  of  a  state  or  territory 
were  civilized  as  well  as  he,  had  consciences  as  well  as  he  and  were 
accountable  to  God  and  their  posterity  and  not  to  him.  It  was  for 
them  to  decide,  therefore,  the  moral  and  religious  right  of  the  slavery 
question  for  themselves  within  their  own  limits.  He  cared  more  for 
the  principle  of  self-government,  the  right  of  the  people  to  rule, 
than  for  all  the  negroes  in  Christendom.  He  would  not  endanger 
the  perpetuity  of  the  Union  nor  blot  out  the  great  inalienable  right 
of  the  white  man  for  all  the  negroes  that  ever  existed.  In  view  of 
Douglas's  attitude  on  the  slavery  question,  the  opposition  of  the 
administration  and  its  office  holders  in  Illinois,  and  the  combination 
of  all  factions  outside  of  the  Democratic  party  against  him,  his  re- 
election was  a  great  triumph. 

The  popular  regard  in  which  he  was  held  and  his  capacity  to 
attract  the  masses  was  never  better  illustrated  than  at  this  time. 
Immediately  following  the  canvass  in  Illinois  he  visited  the  South,  in 
part  for  the  purpose  of  here  improving  his  health  and  in  part  for 
business.  He  endeavored  to  attract  no  attention  but  his  approach 

118 


became  known  as  he  neared  Memphis  and  New  Orleans  and  demonstra- 
tions were  made  in  these  cities,  where  he  was  welcomed  by  throngs 
of  people  who  drew  forth  speeches  from  him  at  each  city.  A  similar 
experience  occurred  in  New  York  on  his  return  from  the  South, 
and  while  here  a  delegation  from  Philadelphia  called  on  him  and 
invited  him  to  deliver  an  address  in  Independence  Hall,  whither  he 
repaired  en  route  to  Washington,  speaking  in  the  old  Cradle  of  Liberty. 

Douglas's  activities  were  not  confined  to  his  labors  as  Senator. 
At  a  fortunate  time  he  made  large  purchases  of  real  estate  in  Chicago 
which  so  advanced  in  value  as  to  give  him  a  substantial  property.  In 
the  midst  of  great  political  excitement,  midway  between  the  repeal 
of  the  Missouri  Compromise  and  the  debates  with  Lincoln,  in  1856, 
he  gave  the  site  of  about  ten  acres  in  the  City  of  Chicago  for  the 
institution  of  learning  known  as  the  University  of  Chicago.  He  was 
the  President  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  and  devoted  much  of  his 
thought  toward  the  close  of  his  career  to  this  institution,  to  which 
he  had  contributed  a  large  portion  of  his  property  in  order  to  place 
within  the  reach  of  the  young  men  of  Chicago  and  the  West  the  ad- 
vantages of  a  higher  education.  He  hoped  and  intended  that  it  should 
be  a  great  University.  He  had  a  broad  conception  of  what  an  institu- 
tion of  this  kind  should  be  and  did  every  thing  in  his  power  to  bring 
it  to  a  high  state  of  efficiency.  Had  he  lived  his  ambition  would 
undoubtedly  been  realized.  He  likewise  took  an  active  interest  in  the 
work  of  the  Smithsonian  Institution.  He  became  a  member  of  the 
Board  of  Regents  and  retained  the  office  until  his  death. 

Senator  Douglas  was  an  ardent  advocate  of  all  just  measures  for 
the  development  of  the  country.  To  this  end  he  gave  his  aid  to  such 
measures  of  legislation  as  looked  to  the  granting  of  public  lands  for 
railroads  and  internal  improvements.  He  was  the  first  to  propose 
a  bill  for  a  grant  of  land  to  settlers  who  should  cultivate  it  for  a 
series  of  years.  In  this  way  he  believed  the  railroads  and  the  settlers 
would  be  wealth  producers  for  the  nation. 

Douglas  had  an  honorable  ambition  to  be  President,  but  like  Clay, 
Webster  and  Elaine  he  held  too  conspicuous  a  place  in  the  public 
councils  to  attain  that  end.  The  halls  of  Congress  have  not  proved 
to  be  the  best  place  from  which  to  start  a  presidential  campaign.  An 
important  part  in  legislative  affairs  is  attended  by  the  making  of 

114 


enemies.  This  was  the  case  with  Douglas.  Franklin  Pierce,  who  had 
retired  from  the  Senate  to  practice  law  in  New  Hampshire,  but  who 
distinguished  himself  in  the  Mexican  War,  was  preferred  to  Douglas 
in  1852  and  Buchanan,  who  was  at  the  Court  of  St.  James  when 
the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  was  passed,  was  chosen  in  preference  to 
him  in  1856.  As  early  as  1840  the  delegation  from  Illinois  presented 
the  name  of  Douglas  to  the  national  Democratic  convention.  He 
was  then  thirty-seven,  the  youngest  statesman  up  to  that  time  to  whom 
had  fallen  such  an  honor.  In  1852  he  had  ninety-two  votes  in  the 
convention  of  his  party  and  in  1856  one  hundred  and  twenty-two. 
Each  time  he  retired  in  the  interest  of  harmony  and  earnestly  sup- 
ported the  nominee.  When  the  convention  of  1860  approached  it  was 
apparent  that  the  Northwest  would  be  for  him  and  a  larger  following 
was  predicted  than  for  any  other  man  in  the  Democratic  party.  The 
nomination  would  be  acceptable  provided  he  could  assume  it  on  prin- 
ciples which  he  believed  to  be  sound,  but  he  would  not  be  a  candidate 
under  any  circumstances  upon  a  platform  that  he  could  not  con- 
scientiously execute.  The  southern  members  of  the  party  demanded 
a  platform  that  should  provide  that  neither  Congress  nor  the  Legisla- 
ture of  a  territory  could  impair  the  constitutional  rights  of  property  in 
slaves  therein;  that  it  was  the  duty  of  Congress  to  provide  adequate 
protection  to  slave  property  and  that  the  people  of  a  territory  could 
pass  on  the  question  of  slavery  only  when  they  adopted  a  state 
constitution.  Such  a  platform  Douglas  would  not  stand  upon  but 
would  insist  on  the  principle  of  popular  sovereignty  as  he  had  ad- 
vocated it. 

The  convention  met  at  Charleston.  It  was  apparent  that  the 
northern  and  southern  members  could  not  agree  on  a  platform. 
The  latter  would  withdraw  if  Douglas  was  nominated  and  the  former 
if  the  platform  declared  for  slavery  in  the  territories.  Douglas's 
platform  was  adopted  by  a  substantial  majority,  whereupon  the  con- 
vention broke  up  to  meet  at  Baltimore  in  June,  where  Douglas  was 
afterwards  nominated.  He  is  the  only  man  of  Vermont  birth  to  have 
received  the  nomination  for  the  presidency.  Before  his  nomination 
the  southern  wing  of  the  party  had  withdrawn  from  the  convention. 
They  formed  a  convention  and  nominated  John  C.  Breckenridge  of 
Kentucky  for  the  presidency.  The  platforms  of  the  two  conventions 

115 


expressed  the  respective  views  of  the  two  factions  on  the  question  of 
slavery.  Bell  and  Everett  represented  another  ticket  known  as  the 
Constitutional  Unionists  and  Lincoln  and  Hamlin  the  Republican 
ticket. 

Douglas  resisted  the  temptation  for  a  time  to  go  on  the  stump 
but  finally  found  himself  making  speeches,  especially  in  the  South. 
It  must  have  been  apparent  to  him  that  he  was  not  going  to  win 
the  election.  But  this  did  not  deter  him  from  a  southern  trip  where 
he  probably  hoped  to  do  good  for  the  Union  if  not  for  himself.  At 
Norfolk  someone  in  the  audience  asked  him  if  the  southern  states 
would  be  justified  in  leaving  the  Union  if  Lincoln  was  elected  Presi- 
dent, to  which  he  emphatically  answered  no,  declaring  in  explanation 
that  the  election  of  any  man  to  the  presidency  of  the  American  people 
in  conformity  with  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  would  not 
justify  any  attempt  at  dissolving  this  glorious  confederacy.  Then  they 
asked  him  whether  if  the  southern  states  seceded  before  an  overt  act 
against  their  constitutional  rights  would  Douglas  advise  or  vindicate 
resistance  to  the  decision.  His  answer  was  that  he  would  do  all  in 
his  power  to  aid  the  government  in  maintaining  the  supremacy  of  the 
laws  against  all  resistance  to  them,  come  from  whatever  quarter  it 
might.  "I  tell  them  No,"  he  said,  "never  on  earth."  At  Raleigh  he 
declared  he  would  hang  every  man  higher  than  Hainan  who  would 
take  arms  against  the  Union.  He  said  that  as  much  as  he  loved 
his  children  he  did  not  desire  to  see  them  survive  this  Union.  He 
was  opposed  to  any  compromise  on  the  question  of  his  platform;  he 
had  fought  twenty-seven  battles  since  he  entered  public  life  and  had 
never  yet  traded  with  nominations  or  submitted  to  treachery.  He 
said  he  did  not  believe  that  it  was  in  his  interest  as  a  public  man  to 
be  President  at  this  time,  but  that  he  loved  the  Union  and  there  was 
no  sacrifice  on  earth  that  he  would  not  make  to  preserve  it.  He  told 
the  people  of  St.  Louis  that  he  had  come  to  make  an  appeal  to  them  in 
behalf  of  the  Union  and  for  the  peace  of  the  country.  At  Memphis 
and  Mobile  he  urged  the  men  of  the  South  to  stay  in  the  Union. 
Douglas  received  more  than  a  million  votes  in  the  field  that  gave 
Lincoln  his  election,  and  though  he  carried  but  one  state  and  had  a 
few  delegates  from  another  his  total  vote  fell  short  of  that  of  Lincoln 
by  only  about  four  hundred  thousand. 

n« 


Douglas  realized  that  Lincoln  was  not  well  known  and  that  in 
his  own  party  there  were  many  men  who  doubted  his  capacity  to  rule 
the  nation.  He,  therefore,  made  haste  to  say  that  the  man  whom 
the  Republicans  had  elected  was  a  very  able  and  a  very  honest  man. 
He  took  a  great  interest  in  Lincoln's  welfare  during  his  early  days  in 
Washington,  laying  aside  all  political  asperities  and  personal  prejudices 
in  his  desire  to  save  the  nation.  In  the  way  of  legislation  it  was 
proposed  that  a  committee  of  thirteen  be  appointed,  as  in  1850,  whose 
first  duty  should  be  to  restore  the  Missouri  Compromise.  This  failed. 
Then  an  irrepealable  constitutional  provision  was  brought  forward  to 
banish  the  slavery  question  from  the  halls  of  Congress  and  the  arena 
of  federal  politics.  "Are  we  prepared  in  our  hearts,"  he  said,  "for 
war  with  out  brethren  and  kindred?  I  confess  I  am  not."  He  was 
ready,  he  said,  to  settle  the  present  difficulties  for  the  preservation  of 
the  Union  as  though  he  had  entertained  no  opinion  theretofore  on  the 
slavery  question.  He  proposed  a  new  fugitive  slave  law,  but  it  was 
not  listened  to.  Kansas  was  admitted  as  a  free  state,  just  as  Douglas 
believed  it  should  be,  and  Colorado,  Dakota  and  Nevada  were  or- 
ganized as  territories  with  no  provisions  as  to  slavery,  exactly  accord- 
ing to  the  principle  of  popular  sovereignty.  When  it  is  considered 
that  this  was  done  by  a  Republican  administration  is  it  any  wonder 
that  Douglas  claimed  the  credit  of  being  right  and  his  opponents 
wrong  in  fighting  him  on  this  issue?  He  induced  the  House  to  pro- 
pose an  amendment  to  the  constitution  denying  to  Congress  the  power 
to  interfere  in  the  domestic  institutions  of  any  state.  He  was  con- 
vinced from  this  that  the  Republicans  had  abandoned  here  their 
aggressive  policy  in  the  territories  and  were  willing  to  give  guarantees 
in  the  states. 

As  early  as  February  he  became  satisfied  that  the  prospect  of 
saving  the  Union  by  legislation  was  not  bright,  and  with  the  absence 
of  any  personal  pique  he  determined  to  see  Lincoln  to  discuss  the 
situation.  Three  days  after  Lincoln's  arrival  at  the  capitol  he  called 
on  him  and  on  this  and  the  following  day  they  discussed  the  critical 
problems  of  the  hour.  He  urged  the  President-elect  to  immediately 
call  a  constitutional  convention  for  an  amendment  such  as  he  had 
proposed  and  in  this  Senator  Seward  agreed.  This  Lincoln  did  not 
care  to  do  without  further  consideration.  The  amendment  limiting 

117 


the  powers  of  Congress  over  the  states  was,  however,  afterwards 
adopted.  Douglas  persuaded  Lincoln  to  add  a  paragraph  to  his 
inaugural  address  in  which  the  President  stated  that  he  had  no  objec- 
tion that  an  amendment  providing  that  the  federal  government  should 
never  interfere  with  the  domestic  institutions  of  the  states  should  be 
made  express  and  irrevocable. 

At  the  inaugural  Douglas  took  great  pains  to  place  himself  at 
the  President's  side,  both  for  the  purpose  of  being  of  any  possible 
assistance  to  his  chief  and  to  assure  the  people  of  his  friendship  and 
loyalty.  Indeed  he  performed  the  humble  service  of  holding  the 
President's  hat  throughout  the  delivery  of  the  address.  He  and  Mrs. 
Douglas,  a  second  wife — a  southern  lady  of  wonderful  beauty  and 
personal  charms — bestowed  every  possible  attention  upon  the  Lincoln 
family  at  the  inaugural  ball  by  displaying  many  acts  of  courtesy  to 
them. 

On  the  sixth  of  March,  from  the  floor  of  the  Senate,  Douglas 
defended  the  inaugural  address,  not  by  throwing  himself  into  the 
arms  of  the  administration  but  by  unqualified  praise  of  those  parts 
which  appealed  to  him  as  being  for  the  good  of  the  Union,  He 
rejoiced  in  the  passage  in  which  the  President  promised  to  use  his 
best  efforts  to  effect  a  peaceful  solution  of  the  national  troubles  and  a 
restoration  of  fraternal  sympathies  and  affections.  While  declaring 
himself  as  being  generally  opposed  to  the  President's  party  and  policy 
he  declared  he  was  with  him  in  his  efforts  to  preserve  the  Union. 

He  was  at  first  reluctant  to  commit  himself  on  the  Fort  Sumter 
situation.  In  answer  to  a  question  by  Senator  Mason  as  to  what  ought 
to  be  done  if  the  garrison  was  starving  he  said  that  if  the  Senator 
had  voted  right  at  the  last  election  he  would  have  been  in  condition 
perhaps  to  have  told  him  authoritatively.  He  ceased  to  be  optimistic 
when  Sumter  was  fired  upon.  It  was  suggested  that  he  make  some 
public  statement  of  his  attitude  on  the  present  troubles  for  its  effect 
on  the  members  of  the  Democratic  party,  more  than  a  million  of  whom 
had  shown  their  confidence  in  him  by  their  ballots.  A  cordial  and 
earnest  consultation  followed.  The  President  read  to  him  his 
proclamation  calling  for  75,000  troops.  Douglas  told  him  that  he 
should  call  for  200,000.  When  this  had  been  said  they  moved  to  a  map 
of  the  United  States  and  here  stood  in  whispered  conference,  absence 

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of  resentment  and  defeated  ambition  on  the  part  of  one,  patient  teach- 
ableness and  self-mastery  on  the  part  of  the  other. 

Douglas  made  a  public  statement  announcing  the  interview  with 
the  President  and  declaring  that  he  was  prepared  to  fully  sustain  the 
executive  in  the  exercise  of  all  his  constitutional  functions  to  preserve 
the  Union,  maintain  the  government  and  defend  the  federal  capitol. 
To  his  friends  he  said  there  could  be  but  two  parties — the  party  of 
patriots  and  the  party  of  traitors — and  that  they  belonged  to  the  first. 

After  this  Douglas  and  the  President  were  in  frequent  consulta- 
tions. The  former  gave  valuable  advice  about  bringing  troops  into 
Washington.  Troubles  for  the  Union  cause  were  brewing  in  southern 
Illinois,  always  of  pro-slavery  tendencies,  and  the  President  advised 
that  the  services  of  Senator  Douglas  were  needed  in  that  quarter  and 
dispatched  him  thither.  This  gave  rise  to  a  report  that  he  had  gone 
to  raise  a  great  army  in  the  Northwest.  He  was  now  in  the  deepest 
confidencies  of  the  administration  and  could  probably  have  had  a 
place  suitable  to  his  talents  and  executive  ability  had  he  been  spared 
for  it.  But  unhappily  fate  had  not  so  decreed.  His  time  on  earth 
was  to  be  brief. 

He  left  Washington  for  his  mission  to  Illinois  but  missed  his  train 
at  Bellaire,  Ohio.  Here  he  spoke  for  the  Union  to  the  men  of  Ohio 
and  Virginia  on  the  banks  of  the  great  river,  urging  them  as  a  band 
of  brothers  to  unite  and  rescue  their  government  and  its  capitol  and 
their  country  from  its  enemies.  Looking  out  upon  the  Ohio  he  ex- 
claimed, "This  great  valley  must  never  be  divided.  The  Almighty 
has  so  arranged  the  valley  and  the  plain  and  the  watercourse  as  to 
show  that  this  valley  in  all  time  shall  remain  one  and  indivisible." 
This  speech  bore  immediate  fruit  for  within  thirty  days  the  Union 
men  had  organized  and  begun  the  campaign  which  brought  West 
Virginia  into  the  Union.  At  Columbus  he  was  called  from  his  room 
at  night  to  speak  a  parting  word  to  the  boys  who  were  to  go  to  the 
front  and  as  his  deep  voice  sounded  forth  a  message  to  them  a  solemn 
amen  arose  from  the  lips  of  his  listeners.  His  first  speech  in  his  own 
state  was  made  at  Springfield.  It  seemed  important  that  this 
should  be  a  telling  blow  for  the  Union  cause.  Senator  Collum — then 
the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives  of  Illinois — describes 
how  his  audience  succumbed  to  the  magic  of  his  eloquence  and  the 


irresistible  logic  of  his  brilliant  mind.  At  a  dramatic  point  during  its 
delivery  the  Stars  and  Stripes  were  brought  in,  when  Douglas 
exclaimed,  his  voice  raised  to  a  high  pitch  and  carrying  to  the  remotest 
listener,  "When  hostile  armies — when  hostile  armies  are  marching, 
under  new  and  odious  banners  against  the  government  of  our  country, 
the  shortest  way  to  peace  is  the  most  stupendous  and  unanimous 
preparation  for  war It  is  a  war  of  defence  of  the  govern- 
ment which  we  have  inherited  as  a  priceless  legacy  from  our  patriotic 
fathers,  in  defence  of  those  great  rights  of  freedom  of  trade,  com- 
merce, transit  and  intercourse  from  the  center  to  the  circumference 
of  our  great  continent.  May  we  so  conduct  the  war,  if  a  collision 
must  come  that  we  will  stand  justified  in  the  eyes  of  Him  who  knows 

our  hearts  and  who  will  justify  our  every  act There  is 

no  path  of  ambition  open  to  me  in  a  divided  country  ....  but 
I  believe  in  my  conscience  that  it  is  a  duty  that  we  owe  to  ourselves 
and  our  children  and  to  our  God,  to  protect  the  government  and  that 
flag  from  every  assailant,  be  he  who  he  may." 

At  Chicago  he  spoke  at  the  Wigwam — filled  now  as  when  Lincoln 
was  nominated  the  year  before  with  ten  thousand  people.  There 
is  a  greatness  about  the  occasion  that  is  pathetic.  The  place  is  one 
that  saw  the  organization  completed  which  placed  his  rival  for  the 
presidency  in  nomination.  It  heard  the  patriotic  resolutions  of  the 
successful  party  in  the  campaign  of  1860.  It  resounded  with  the 
oratory  of  the  great  chieftains  of  the  political  organization  that  had 
raised  Lincoln  to  the  presidency  and  had  sent  Douglas  to  defeat. 
To  such  a  place  and  to  an  audience  made  up  of  men  who  were  in 
considerable  part  there  the  year  before  Douglas  had  come,  a  defeated 
candidate  in  a  national  election  for  an  office  to  which  he  had  aspired 
with  honorable  ambition,  a  partisan  in  violent  opposition  to  the  creeds 
of  the  successful  party,  he  had  come  as  a  patriot  at  the  bidding  of  his 
rival  to  lend  his  gifted  voice  and  powerful  influence  to  the  cause  of 
the  Union.  Does  this  leave  any  doubt  about  the  greatness  and 
patriotism  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas?  Again  in  an  eloquent  address 
he  urged  his  countrymen  to  stand  by  the  Union  and  to  defend  the 
flag.  "Arms  have  been  raised,"  he  said,  "war  is  levied  .... 
there  are  only  two  sides  to  the  question.  Every  man  must  be  for 
the  United  States  or  against  it.  There  can  be  no  neutrals  in  this  war, 

120 


only  patriots  or  traitors."  ....  And  then  thinking  no  doubt  of 
friends  and  family  ties  in  the  South,  he  said,  ''But  we  must  remember 
certain  restraints  on  our  action  even  in  time  of  war.  We  are  a 
Christian  people  and  the  war  must  be  prosecuted  in  a  manner 
recognized  by  Christian  nations.  We  must  not  violate  constitutional 
rights.  The  innocent  must  not  suffer  nor  women  and  children  be 
victims." 

Exhausted  from  the  efforts  and  anxieties  which  he  had  lately 
experienced  he  was  overcome  with  an  illness  which  lingered  for 
several  weeks  and  ended  in  a  delirium,  during  which  his  thoughts 
were  still  of  his  country  and  its  preservation  from  its  enemies.  Once 
he  was  heard  to  exclaim,  "Telegraph  to  the  President  and  let  the 
column  move  on."  On  the  return  of  consciousness  at  the  last,  his 
wife  bent  over  him  and  asked  him  if  there  was  any  message  he  wished 
to  send  to  his  sons.  He  whispered,  "Tell  them  to  obey  the  laws  and 
support  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States."  These  were  his  last 
words. 

With  a  pomp  befitting  an  emperor  the  great  statesman  was 
buried  beside  Lake  Michigan.  The  spot  is  close  by  the  University 
which  he  founded.  It  is  beside  the  central  highway  which  was  created 
by  his  supreme  effort.  It  is  in  the  midst  of  the  imperial  City  of 
Chicago  which  loved  him  and  upon  which  he  reflected  so  much  glory. 
Here  to  the  requiem  of  the  beating  waves  it  is  well  that  he  should 
sleep.  Above  the  fitting  spot,  tall  and  imposing  and  crowned  by  the 
statue  of  the  orator,  statesman  and  patriot,  stands  the  column  erected 
by  the  state  of  his  adoption  to  remind  his  own  and  succeeding  genera- 
tions what  manner  of  man  he  was.  And  we  of  his  native  state  on 
the  centenary  of  his  birth  and  fifty-two  years  after  his  death  in  such 
a  blaze  of  glory  do  well  to  honor  his  memory.  His  great  talents  com- 
mand our  admiration.  His  services  for  his  country's  expansion  and 
development  merit  our  respect  and  praise.  If  mistakes  were  made, 
let  us  attribute  these  to  a  broad,  though  erring  statesmanship,  and  not 
to  selfish  ambition.  And  whatever  faults  may  have  been  his  and 
whatever  prejudices  may  have  existed,  let  these  be  forgotten  in  the 
thought  that  Stephen  A.  Douglas  stood  side  by  side  and  hand  in  hand 
with  Abraham  Lincoln,  as  long  as  life  was  spared  to  him,  in  defence 
of  the  American  Union. 

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